


When the feelings's right, I'm gonna run all night

by red_sky



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Adult Losers Club (IT), Angst, Blow Jobs, Cheating, Childhood Trauma, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, Gay Eddie Kaspbrak, Gay Richie Tozier, Heavy Angst, Infidelity, Internal Conflict, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Phone Sex, Post-Canon Fix-It, Sonia Kaspbrak's A+ Parenting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-18
Updated: 2020-04-09
Packaged: 2020-10-20 23:48:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 26,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20683964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/red_sky/pseuds/red_sky
Summary: When Eddie makes a vow, he means it. It's just a shame that the two most important vows he's ever made conflict with each other.





	1. I. Wouldn't hurt her if she didn't know

**Author's Note:**

> Hiiiii, sooooo. Like everyone else, I saw the first IT and loved it, and Richie became my son. No, really, he's my son because I am also a dark-haired, glasses-wearing, foul-mouthed asshole. And like most parents, I adopted Eddie as my own because that's what you do with your children's friends. It was innocent. It was pure. I loved these idiot children.
> 
> But then I saw IT: Chapter Two, and also like everyone else, I went to see a scary clown movie and lost my will to live over my now adult gay son Richie and his also adult and HOT AS FUCKING HOT HOT HOT HOT boyfriend Eddie.
> 
> So this story exists primarily for these reasons.
> 
> 1\. I love my not-dead gay son Richie Tozier.  
2\. James Ransone ticks EVERY SINGLE ONE OF MY BUTTONS HOLY FUCKING SHIT WHERE HAS HE BEEN MY ENTIRE FUCKING LIFE I'LL BE IN MY GODDAMN BUNK.  
3\. Canon? I don't know her. Eddie lived wtf why y'all wildin' out.  
4\. However it wouldn't be ME if I didn't emotionally torture the people in my fics, you know?  
5\. I'm old enough to have given birth to some of you, and I was on my way home today from my boring office job like Eddie Kaspbrak, and I was listening to the goddamn 80's station on Sirius XM, and Bryan Adams' song "Run To You" came on the radio. And I was like, "Well, guess I gotta write a fic based on a song about cheating on your wife now!" No, really, it's about cheating on your spouse. [Here you go for reference.](https://youtu.be/nCBASt507WA)
> 
> I think that's it??? Of course the usual disclaimers apply, I'm not gonna get into it. Also it's unbeta-ed, cause I do what I want. Obviously if there's any stupid glaring mistakes, please let me know, but please enjoy too.

No one would ever say that Eddie doesn’t take things seriously. He takes _ everything _ seriously, so seriously that he turned it into a goddamn career, for fuck’s sake. One of the things he takes the most seriously, though, are his wedding vows. When he stands in front of Myra, reciting the vows that some priest he has never met until now is telling him to say, he parrots every word, every syllable back. For better, for worse, in sickness and in health, until death do us part. He _ means _it.

Ten years later, Eddie receives a phone call from Mike, telling him the news he hadn’t even known he had been dreading for twenty-seven years. He took an oath back then, too, and if there’s one thing that Eddie Kaspbrak does, he means what he fucking says.

He tells Myra that he has to go back home for a family emergency, that one of his aunts is on her deathbed. Having met Eddie’s aunts, she’s perfectly happy to stay home and keep away. He tells her he’ll be gone a week and a half, at most. He’ll call her every day and remember to take all of his various medications as always. 

This is the first lie he’s ever told his wife, but he knows it’s for the best. He doesn’t want to involve her in this madness. It’s for her own good.

They say that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, but Eddie has been to Hell already, and he’s driving back there. There’s nothing good about Hell or Derry.

But when he’s back home, waiting with Bill and Mike for the others, and he hears Richie Tozier’s voice for the first time in twenty-seven years, something tells Eddie that maybe there is something good in Hell and Derry both after all.

The second lie Eddie tells his wife comes three days later, and it’s not even from him, per se. As he lays in the hospital, bleeding like a stuck pig and fighting for his life, Mike finds Eddie’s cell phone and calls Myra after she’s left fourteen frantic, screaming voicemails. It’s all over the news, an uncharacteristic earthquake hitting the small, quaint little town of Derry, Maine. Calmly and kindly, Mike explains to her that yes, Eddie has been injured in the quake, yes, he is in the hospital, yes, it is serious, and yes, she should come as quickly as possible.

When he wakes up for good after four days of going in and out, his wife is at his bedside, holding his hand in a vice grip. Her face is red, puffy, and blotchy (she is not a pretty crier, never has been), her hair is in one of those buns that teenage girls are so fond of it, but it just looks like a tiny little door knob on top of her head. “Oh God,” she cries, launching out of the chair next to him and throwing herself at him. “Oh God, Eddie! Thank God! Thank God”

He feels a lot of things when she does that. Pain in his chest from her holding onto him too tightly, stiffness in his legs and hips from having laid in a hospital bed for four days straight, fogginess in his head as he tries to figure out what the hell is going on, where he is, what day it is. Guilt swirling in his gut, feeling like shit for putting his wife through this. 

The others also hug him and cry and sob and thank a God he definitely doesn’t believe in anymore when they find out he’s finally awake. Only Richie hugs him as tightly as Myra did, but it doesn’t hurt much. It doesn’t occur to him to wonder why that is, it just is what it is. Nothing hurts as much as long as Richie’s there. Eddie found that out when they were in the sewers.

Myra is polite as Eddie introduces her to every single one of his childhood friends (brothers, he thinks, they are his brothers and his sister), and she’s even a little starstruck as she shakes Bill’s hand (she loves his books, thinks they’re scary, but she hates the endings. Bill for some reason lets out a belly laugh when she says that). But Eddie can feel the anxiety radiating from her. She’s ready to go and take him home and take care of him like all good wives do, and pretend that none of this ever happened. 

When they get back to New York and their condo, she smiles at him and strokes his hand. It almost feels possessive. “Aren’t you glad to be back home?” she says.

He lies again and tells her yes. It should worry him that it’s getting easier and easier to do this, but it doesn’t. The truth always hurts anyway.

A few months later, Eddie is back at it. He’s back to being able to move around on his own and shower on his own. He’s back to eating his sensible three meals and two small snacks a day, back to cycling three times a week before work. He’s back to only taking medications for his various allergies and normal aches and pains, not just painkillers. He’s back to work, from seven am to six pm, sometimes working late until nine or ten. He’s back in his bed by eleven pm, sleeping on the left side of the bed as his wife sleeps next to him. Everything is in its right place.

His firm lands a new client, and Eddie is asked to meet with them in Los Angeles. He doesn’t hesitate to say yes. It’s only when he gets home and tells Myra that he realizes that maybe he should have talked to her about it first. She understandably has more reservations about him going anywhere without her, but she can’t get off work in such a short notice. He promises her that he will be careful, that she can use the GPS tracker on his phone to keep tabs on him at all times, she can do anything and everything she needs to do in order to reassure herself that he will be fine. 

He doesn’t tell her that he’s already texted Richie (as soon as he got out of the meeting with his superiors), and they’ve already made plans to hang out all weekend long whenever Eddie is not busy with work. He thinks it would just make her worry unnecessarily.

He arrives in Los Angeles on Tuesday, he has dinner with Richie that night, and they do the typical Bros-Catching-Up bit. Richie tells Eddie that he’s working on a new show, all him, no writers, and he hopes to be finished in a few months; he’s shooting for Netflix, but Comedy Central would be good, too. Eddie tries to tell him about what brought him to LA, but Richie cuts him off and tells him he would rather get a root canal while laying on a bed of hot coal than listen to Eddie talk about his job. 

Richie does not ask how Myra is doing. Eddie does not mention her anyway.

The next night they meet up again, and this time get drunk. They’re at some tiny little hole in the wall, and they’re just knocking back shots left and right. Eddie’s pretty sure that Richie is trying to get him drunk, and accuses him of such. Richie just throws his head back and laughs. “Fuck yeah I’m trying to get you drunk! You deserve it, you looked Death in the face and said ‘Nope, nuh-uh, not today, bitch!’”

“I kinda did, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, you did!” Eddie can’t help but smile at the way Richie’s eyes crinkle when he smiles or laughs. But all of a sudden, his smile fades, and he puts his hands on Eddie’s shoulders. “Dude you got stabbed in the gut and _ survived,_” he says. His eyes are wide behind his glasses, and he moves one hand up to Eddie’s neck. His hand is hot, too fucking hot. “Nobody survives that shit. ‘Cept you. Only you get stabbed in the gut and fucking _ live_.”

The way Richie’s looking at him, like he’s some kind of fucking miracle, makes Eddie feel a certain way. It’s weird, and uncomfortable, but it’s not exactly bad per se. He’s just not used to it. “Yeah, yeah,” he mutters under his breath. “Whatever, man.”

When they get back to Richie’s apartment, an especially spacious house that seems too big for just one person, they are more than just drunk; they are five thousand percent _ plastered_. Both of them are stumbling around the living room, Eddie is attempting to get his shoes off while Richie’s efforts are concentrated on finding more booze.

Not that they need any, but who are they to kick a gift horse in the mouth? He’s also singing Copacabana at the top of his lungs (because of _course _he is), dancing in front of the fridge and shimmying his shoulders. It’s ridiculous, Richie should never attempt to dance while sober, let alone drunk as a fucking skunk. “Goddamn Rich, you don’t need any more-”

As if on cue, Richie takes one step back into the living room, loses his balance, and tips over. He’s cackling and sprawled out on the floor, and Eddie starts laughing so hard there’s tears in his eyes. He walks (shuffles, it’s more of a shuffle to be honest) over to Richie and leans down, pointing at him. “I told you, what did I say? I said you don’t need any more booze, you fucking lush, now look at you. Look at you, you’re on the fucking floor. Good job...good job, dude.”

Eddie should expect for Richie to retaliate. But he doesn’t, and before he knows it, Richie sticks one of his legs out, and Eddie’s tripping over it. He hits the floor with a dull thud, sprawled stomach down in Richie’s lap with his head less than three inches from a glass coffee table. Now that’s a hazard and a half. They’re a mess of tangled limbs, and Richie just cackles and slaps the back of Eddie’s head. “Damn, Eds, for a short shit you’re fucking heavy.”

It’s familiar, the way they bicker, and Eddie immediately turns and angles himself so he’s actually sitting in Richie’s lap, his thighs pressed firmly into Richie’s hips. He grins down at Richie triumphantly. “Yeah, and you’re about to get your ass kicked by a short shit.”

“Fat fuck, I can’t breathe…” All of a sudden, Richie falls silent. He looks at Eddie, and something in Eddie’s stomach just drops. He realizes what this looks like; he’s stradling Richie, he’s fucking_ straddling _him, like they’re about to...to…

Everything just stops. Richie is looking up at him, and Eddie knows that he’s just realized it, too. For a second, Eddie thinks Richie is going to crack a joke, something about this position being a favorite of his mother’s too. But Richie doesn’t make a joke; he licks his lips and mutters, “Can’t breathe.”

Eddie can’t breathe, either. His throat is dry, his head is swimming, he has no idea what the fuck is happening. All he knows is that Richie is warm and solid and looking up at him, and Eddie is hungry. No, not hungry..._ starving_. He feels like he’s been starving for centuries, not just forty years, and it’s like Richie is telling him, do it, do it, take it, take it...

So Eddie does. He pins Richie down by his shoulders, licks his own lips, and grinds down. 

For the rest of his life, he will never forget the look on Richie’s face. How he closes his eyes, like the universe itself has just opened up for him, and his mouth falls open just the tiniest bit. He lets out this small, strangled breath that makes Eddie tingle. He whispers Eddie’s name, like it just slips out of him without him even knowing it. It’s a quiet reaction, one full of restraint. And Eddie understands, he really does; he knows all about restraint.

But he wants. God, he fucking wants, with every single fiber of being. He doesn’t know what he wants, he just knows that he _ wants _to want. He shouldn’t, there’s a billion reasons why he shouldn’t...he’s drunk, Richie’s drunk, they don’t know what they’re doing, they’re drunk, they’re drunk…

It’s only when Eddie’s phone rings from the inside of his jacket pocket that he remembers the most important reason of all; he’s married. He’s married, he took vows, and he’s on top of Richie like he’s going to fuck him.

It’s the cold slap to his face that he needs to wake up. He scrambles up and away from Richie, using the table to balance himself and trying not to put his hands through the goddamn glass. ‘I gotta...Myra…”

“Eddie-”

“I...ugh...I’ll get a...an Uber or something,” he mutters. To be honest, he’s not paying too much attention to Richie. He’s stumbling for his jacket, having dropped it by the door, and he’s struggling not to panic. The telltale signs are there; his breathing is picking up, his vision is getting blurry (or is that the alcohol?), and his chest is clenching up inside.

“Eddie, wait-”

“Night, Rich.” Miracle of miracles, Eddie gets out of the apartment before the panic attack sets in. He’s not so lucky on the ride back to his hotel, and it lasts through most of the night. He’s finally able to calm down enough to text Myra back and tell her that he’s fine, the firm’s new clients have expensive taste in alcohol and he’s just trying to sleep it off. He promises to take something to help with the inevitable hangover, and tries to remind himself that she’s just bitching because she cares.

He had planned on staying an extra day so he and Richie could hang out, but he changes his flight and heads back home immediately. Myra is surprised, but beaming when he walks in the door. He tells her that things went well with the client, and he came home early because he missed her.

This is the fourth, maybe fifth lie he tells his wife.

It is not going to be last.


	2. II. You keep me comin' round

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, hi, sorry for taking too long to post this. I've had 6.8 million more ideas for fics because these two are RUINING MY LIFE, so it's taken a while. But HEY! WE'RE HERE NOW, RIGHT?
> 
> As far as warnings go, there's some fairly mature/explicit stuff in the sexual sense happening here, so tread carefully if that's not your bag. If it is your bag, then great! Also it's unbeta-ed, so if there's mistakes, I'll find them in a couple of days and update it and remind everyone that while I did take high school English, I also graduated fifteen years ago and you miss shit when you get old, thank you very much.

They don’t talk about it. Eddie knows that they should, but for once in his goddamn life, he doesn’t know what to say. There’s a part of him that’s not even sure if it really happened. If it was just some good old fashioned alcohol-induced wet dream, or even a hallucination. Maybe the fucking clown isn’t dead after all, and it’s fucking with Eddie’s mind and brain and body. That’s what he tells himself, until he dreams about it like four times in three weeks. He wakes up each morning blurry-eyed and literally aching, but he also refuses to do anything about it, just wills his body to fucking stop already. If he doesn’t do anything about it, then it’s not really happening. He can pretend, pretend, pretend.

It takes a little less than two months for one of them to finally crack, and he’s sickly proud of himself that it’s Richie who does. Eddie’s in the middle of another meeting that makes his eyes roll so far they’re going to roll right out of his skull one of these days, and his phone starts vibrating on the desk. He only means to take a quick glance, just to see who it is, but when he sees Richie’s name pop up, his heart falls straight out of his ass, and suddenly he can’t _ breathe_.

He excuses himself from the meeting and hightails to the restroom, like he’s fourteen years old all over again and sneaking into the bathroom to jerk off. He holds his breath as he reads Richie’s text; he’s in town, Eddie’s town, Eddie’s New York City, for work stuff. Wants to know if he wants to meet up. 

Eddie should tell him that he’s swamped with work, maybe some other time. Instead, he texts Richie back asking where he’s staying, and in rapid fire succession, sends a text to Myra telling her that he’ll be working late tonight.

Eddie is known for being one of the last three people to leave the office in the evening, but this time he’s first out the door. He tries to tell himself that there’s nothing off or weird about the situation. He’s just going to see an old friend, his best friend. The brother he never had, one of the few people in the world who’s been through the same shit he’s been through. There’s nothing wrong with being this anxious to see an old friend, his excitement doesn’t _ mean _anything.

It doesn’t mean anything. He keeps telling himself that on the way to Richie’s hotel. He keeps telling himself that as they have dinner in the hotel’s restaurant. He keeps telling himself that when they’re done eating and Richie orders a drink, and offers to buy Eddie one too.

It certainly doesn’t mean anything when he takes Richie up on that offer. 

But it does mean something; he knows it, and worse, Richie knows it. He knows Eddie better than he knows himself, the motherfucker, and he just keeps looking at Eddie, like he’s waiting for something. After what feels like an eternity, he finally says something. “Hey, man, look, I don’t wanna be weird or anything…”

“Too late.” The words come out of Eddie’s mouth before he can stop himself.

But Richie just rolls his eyes at him. “Beep beep to you, asshole. I just...I just wanted to say sorry. ‘Bout the last time we hung out and everything.”

And there it was. It takes less than a second for Eddie’s heart to start racing, and he is truly not drunk enough for this. He wonders what the right play is; should he pretend that he doesn’t know what Richie’s talking about? Should he acknowledge it? And why the fuck is Richie apologizing anyway, he’s not the one who started...whatever the fuck it was that happened.

Goddamn it. He downs his drink in one shot and motions for the waiter to come back over. A little voice in the back of his head reminds him that booze got him into this mess in the first place, but he tells that voice to shut the fuck up. “It’s fine,” he finds himself saying, and he’s a little proud of himself. It’s the correct response; it acknowledges that what happened happened, but that there’s no need to discuss it any further.

Thankfully, Richie seems to get the memo. He just nods at Eddie, but he doesn’t say anything. He just stares at Eddie with a look on his face that Eddie’s never seen before; it’s not scared, or frightened or anything of the sort. It’s not even angry or pissed off. It’s almost...hurt in a way. Like he’s imagined himself in this scenario before, but can’t quite believe it’s actually happening. Just seeing that look on his face makes Eddie feel like he’s being stabbed in the gut again, and he has to look away from Richie. Fuck, what the fuck has he done? What the fuck is even his life right now? 

The waiter comes back with another drink, and Eddie drinks it so fast he ends up choking. The irony of him not dying from a demon clown skewering him, but from choking on his drink isn’t lost on him. Richie starts clapping him on the back, hard enough it stings a little, asking him if he’s alright and if he forgot how to swallow. When he’s finally able to, Eddie wheezes back a fuck you and takes a big gulp of the water he had with dinner. It takes him a few moments to realize that Richie's hand is no longer on his back, but on his knee, patting it. 

It's supposed to be a friendly gesture. Eddie knows this. And it's not like it's an unusually friendly gesture in the context of their friendship, they used to do things like this all the time. Always patting each other's knees and forearms, elbowing each other in the ribs, legs intertwined on the couch, pushing each other down into the water. Theirs was always a tactile friendship.

But there's something different this time. Richie's hand is _ big _ and _ warm_, so warm, and he’s looking at him like he's transfixed. It makes Eddie’s stomach drop, and he wraps his own hand around Richie’s wrist. As if telling Richie alright, that’s enough, this is not the appropriate level of tactile, but he can’t say that, because saying something makes it real, and that is ludicrous, because this isn’t real, there’s nothing happening, there is absolutely _ nothing happening_. 

Neither of them make a move. Richie is still, his hand still sitting on top of Eddie’s knee, and Eddie is looking anywhere but at him, still holding Richie’s wrist. It takes everything he has not to rub his thumb against the underside of Richie’s wrist, and Richie breaks the silence. “Uh, sorry, I didn’t-”

Eddie finally looks up and meets Richie’s eyes. In this lighting, his eyes look wide and dark, and he can visibly see Richie swallow what has to be a lump in his throat. Richie’s gaze flickers from Eddie’s face to their hands, and back up again. It’s like he’s paralyzed.

Eddie is, too. Paralyzed by this unfamiliar feeling swirling in his gut, and he feels like he can’t do anything but hold onto Richie and think; _ touch me, touch me, touch me. _

He looks back up at Richie, and he can hear the thought that's running through _Richie’s _head; _let_ _me, let me, let me. _

Eddie knows he shouldn't let him. He shouldn't let anything happen. But it's like he's lost control of his limbs, and he's pushing Richie’s hand up his leg, past his knee. They’ve done this before. Eddie remembers this happening before, them sitting together, Richie touching his leg, holding his calf. He doesn’t remember when it happened, but he remembers that it did, and the realization makes him nervous.

Richie's mouth opens a little, but he doesn't say anything. He slides his hand just a little further inside Eddie's thigh, and he curls his fingers like he’s tracing letters against Eddie’s skin, and Eddie can't _ breathe_.

Richie's fingers slide higher up, and Eddie's not stopping him. He's parting his legs to give Richie more room. He's looking down at Richie's hand, and he gulps as he watches Richie's fingers reach the zipper of his slacks. His brain explodes when Richie thumbs at it, but doesn't pull it down. He just keeps thumbing at it, and it's the _ hottest fucking thing that's ever happened to him. _

They look up at each other again. Richie's mouth is still parted and that feeling of want feels like a boulder inside Eddie's chest. He _ wants _ and _ craves _ and _ needs _ , and it scares the shit out of him cause he’s never wanted or craved or needed anything like this. He’s always felt apathetic at best about being close to anyone. This is different, though. He doesn’t know how, or why, but he knows that this is _ different_.

“Eddie,” Richie whispers his name as if it’s a prayer and a curse and nothing in between. He’s never sounded like this before, and Eddie imagines him saying it again, and again, and _ again… _

“Pay the check.” He’s never sounded like this before either, and he can’t help but notice the way Richie closes his eyes, for just a second, after he speaks. “Pay the check, Rich, and let’s go.”

The world as Eddie knows it disintegrates when they reach Richie’s room.

Richie steps in first, and Eddie barely gets the door shut before Richie has his hands on his shoulders and is pushing him against the wall. He doesn’t have time to protest before Richie’s closing the distance between them, and putting one hand on Eddie’s neck. The other hand is trailing down his chest and before he even knows what’s happening, Richie’s undoing the button on his slacks and pulling down the zipper, and sliding his hand into Eddie’s pants, and holy fuck, this is happening. This is fucking _ happening_.

He should push Richie off him, but Richie’s hand is down his pants, and he’s touching him, Richie is pressing his palm flat against Eddie’s dick. He’s rubbing it and oh God, Richie’s touching his fucking dick, and instead of freaking out, Eddie feels like he’s boiling alive. He’s grabbing Richie by the neck and pulling him close enough that they’re breathing on each other, and the thing is, they’re not drunk, they’re nowhere near drunk like last time, and they’re still...they’re still…

Shit. Fuck._ Fucking shit. _

It feels so fucking good. It feels like every hair on Eddie’s body is standing up and every nerve inside him is on fire; even his fucking toes are curling inside his shoes. It dawns on him that Richie knows what he’s doing, he’s pressing the heel of his hand up just right way, his fingers brush just slightly against his balls, and he’s just looking at him. Looking at Eddie’s mouth, he’s cupping his jaw with his free hand, and he’s panting like _ he’s _the one getting a handjob. Eddie moans at the word in his head; handjob. He’s getting a handjob. Richie is giving him a handjob.

As soon as Eddie moans, it’s like a switch goes off in Richie’s head, and it’s go time. He’s pulling his hand out of Eddie’s pants and grabbing his leg, gripping his thigh and lifting it so Eddie has to wrap it around Richie’s waist. And when that happens, Eddie’s brain starts leaking out of his ears, cause now they’re pressed right up against each other, hips flushed, and he can feel Richie’s dick against his, and he’s hard, and this is _ not happening_. Except it is, the heat trapped between them is proof of that, and as if Eddie needs more confirmation that it’s real, Richie rolls his hips and oh god, the spark that ignites in Eddie’s gut is going to swallow them both whole.

“Fuck,” Richie whispers, his voice so low it makes Eddie shudder. He wants to make Richie sound like that forever. He clutches Eddie’s leg like he’ll blow away if he lets go, and he thrusts against Eddie again, and again, until it becomes a pattern. It’s obvious that Richie has done this before. He starts mouthing at Eddie’s jaw, not kissing him, but sucking on patches of skin. It tickles and Richie’s _ moaning_, these tiny little moans that come from the back of his throat in between whispering Eddie’s name.

It’s awkward. Eddie has to grab Richie’s shoulders and almost stand on his tiptoes so that their hips are flush against the other’s, instead of Richie’s dick pressed against, like, Eddie’s stomach or whatever. They’re panting like they’re running a marathon and they’re so close, Eddie can almost every pore on Richie’s face. So yeah, it’s awkward, but the burn in his calves is worth it. It’s so, so worth it, because sex has never felt like this, he’s never felt like this, or maybe he has. Maybe he has and he’s just forgotten.

He already knows that he never, ever wants to forget again, should that be the case.

He tightens his grip on Richie’s shoulders, handfuls of Richie’s shirt in his fists as he thrusts up against Richie. He turns his head so Richie can mouth or suck or whatever on his neck, and as soon as Richie kisses a spot right behind his earlobe, Eddie knows this is gonna last maybe five minutes, tops. To say it’s embarrassing would be an understatement, but it’s been so long and Richie feels so fucking good, and Eddie can’t help it. He tries to murmur a warning, but it just comes out as a groan that Richie reciprocates, panting, “It’s okay, it’s okay, me too, me too…”

At least Eddie’s not alone in that department.

At least he’s not alone. 

That’s what he thinks later when Richie kisses the corner of his mouth, and rubs himself against Eddie in just the right way, and he comes harder than he ever has in entire life.

That’s what he thinks later when Richie shakes and shudders in his arms when he comes, too.

At least he’s not alone.

But that’s not what he’s thinking when they’ve cleaned up and Eddie is on his way home, trying to tiptoe quietly into his house as to not wake Myra. She’s a light sleeper, and any little noise can trigger her. And if she doesn’t get the doctor-recommended eight and a half hours of sleep, she can be a real terror. 

The next morning, he kisses a happy, well-rested Myra goodbye as he leaves for work and promises that he’ll be home in time for them to go out to dinner. It’s a bald-faced lie. He suppresses the urge to wipe at his mouth when he gets in the car, and tries not to think about Richie kissing him. 

He fucks up, though. He sends a text to Richie, and tells him to eat before they meet up tonight. Richie replies back with a winking emoji, like he knows exactly what Eddie meant by that and Eddie’s face burns. He feels stupid for it, because nothing’s going to happen again. It was just...it was just…

Now Eddie’s lying to himself, but then again...it’s not the first or last time he does that, either.


	3. III. But you're the one who always turns me on

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello there. So my thirst situation has extended beyond James Ransone and now includes Bill Hader. This is what my life has become. But it's okay, I'm fine. I AM FINE (She was not fine.)
> 
> The mature/explicit stuff continues on in this chapter, but there's also some angst and introspection??? I feel like this is what experts call growth. There is also some brief discussion regarding both Sonia Kaspbrak's A+ Parenting and the death of Eddie's father, but nothing too detailed, so it shouldn't be triggering. If it is, though, please let me know and I will tag appropriately!
> 
> I would love to say that things will get better for them, but then I would be lying. It's not going to get better.

To say that Eddie has issues with intimacy would be the understatement of the century.

It doesn’t matter what kind of intimacy it is; he’s uncomfortable with every single possible form of it. He’s driven himself crazy over the years, trying to figure out exactly why his hands get clammy when someone touches him, why the hair on his arms stands up when someone stands too close to him, why he gets sick to his stomach when his wife wants to _talk_, or why he wants to run away screaming when someone tells him they love him or need him.

It’s because he learned a long time ago, long before he found out about the fake pills, before he fought an evil space clown with his friends, that intimacy was _painful_. It lead to nothing but pain and fear and guilt. But it wasn’t a person who taught him that; it was cancer, and it killed his father.

He doesn’t remember much of his father; he doesn’t know if that was because he was so young when he died, or if the curse affected his memories pre-Pennywise, too. What he does know about his father, he’s learned from pictures, mostly. He knows he looks more like his father than his mother. He knows that his father had a nice smile, he’s always smiling in every picture Eddie’s ever seen. He knows that his father used to put him in his lap and help him make model cars, because Eddie was small and sickly and couldn’t do the things that other little boys could do. But he knows it hadn’t mattered to his father, because there are pictures of them together and the smile on his father’s face is filled with so much love, it makes Eddie’s chest ache just to look at it.

But then his father got sick, and it was sudden. He wasn’t given any warning, no one ever told him what was going on; not his father, not his mother, no one. He watched, confused as his father would get sick in the bathroom, as he got skinnier and skinnier, as he lost his hair. There are no pictures from the time when his father was sick, but Eddie thinks that even then, his father had still smiled at him and loved him anyway.

Then one day, his father went to the hospital, and Eddie never saw him again.

He was five years old when he learned the cruelest lesson of all; that being close to someone, _anyone_, meant they would leave you behind.

And then his mother lost her damn mind, and she picked right up where cancer had left off. She was his next teacher in the shitshow that was life, and he _aced_ her classes. He absorbed her lessons like a sponge; people are dirty, people are diseased, the world is diseased, rotting from the inside. Keep yourself at arms’ length, keep yourself safe. Don’t get too close, or you’ll catch it, too, Eddie. Don’t trust anyone, always be on guard. He didn’t need anyone but her; after all, _he_ was all _she_ needed, so it had to be the same for him too.

Unfortunately for both of them, she also inadvertently taught him the opposite lessons; that love is terrible. Love is conditional, dependent on how you behave and how much you give up for them. Love is uncomfortable. Love is suffocating, it feels like hands wrapped around your neck, choking you. Love is infilitating someone else to the point where you no longer exist; they just fill you up until there’s no more room for _you_.

Eddie left home at 18 for college, and made it a point to avoid any and all attempts at love and intimacy. He hadn’t dated in high school at all, and didn’t lose his virginity until he was 21. It was with a girl in one of his classes; Erica was her name, and she kissed him first. He was so nervous that he actually had a panic attack mid-way through, and they had to stop. Neither of them came, and they never talked to each other again.

After college, he tried to date, and it led to a couple of brief relationships that really weren’t relationships. It was more or less him meeting a girl and attempting to ask her out, and she would take pity on him. They’d have sex two or three times, but it’d be awkward and embarrassing every time. Sometimes he’d have a panic attack, sometimes he’d get sick to his stomach and have to stop. Other times he couldn’t stay hard; sometimes he couldn’t get there at all. And they would just stop talking to each other, because what else was there to do?

And then he met Myra, and sure, it was awkward at first, just like every single one of his attempts at intimacy. But she didn’t seem to mind when he didn’t want to have sex, or if he didn’t come whenever they did, and for the first year they dated, he kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. He kept waiting for her to bring it up, to ask him what was wrong, but she didn’t.

When the subject finally came up, he was the one to initiate the conversation, and after apologizing profusely for his inability to perform and beating himself up for it, she hushed him and told him it was okay. Everyone has issues, she said. No one is a perfect, blank slate when they get into a relationship, they come with baggage and issues and scars.

That was when he told her about his mother, about their fucked up, toxic relationship. She listened and held his hand as he talked, and he tried not to squirm at the feel of her skin against his. She told him it wasn’t his fault, and they could deal with it together. And they did; she tried to learn how to hold back on physical affection, he tried to learn how to exhibit some once in a while. She tried to learn how to go to other people for the emotional support she needed, and he tried to learn how to give it to her when she _really_ needed it from her husband and not someone else. They didn’t always succeed, there were definitely some fights about it, but the important thing was that they _tried_.

Before coming back to Derry, he was fine with it. He wouldn’t say he was content with his life, that wouldn’t be true, but he accepted that this was his life and it was okay. He was broken, but it was okay because he had _survived_. He had survived, and he was alive, and he had a wife who loved him in spite of his brokenness.

But then he survived a battle with an interdimensional space clown and getting stabbed in the chest, and he learns a couple of things in the process.

One: Almost dying really makes you re-evaluate every moment of your life, every decision you’ve ever made, every decision you haven’t made. It makes you think about yourself, your environment, the people you’ve chosen to let into your life. It makes you think about shit you don’t want to think about, and about shit you didn’t even know you _needed_ to think about.

Two: Almost dying can also really, _really_ fuck you up and make you do shit that you would never, ever even dream of doing, pre-almost dying.

That is how he’s able to justify what he’s done in the following weeks after Richie goes back to Los Angeles. Temporary insanity caused by the trauma of defeating an ancient evil and almost dying in the process. Trauma bonding is a thing, after all, and maybe that’s all it is. He and Richie have been through things together that other people could never dream of; it’s a good theory until he remembers that there are four _other_ people who went through the same thing, and they’re not boning. Well, except for Bev and Ben, but that just lends more weight to his theory. Trauma bonding. Unfortunate but no one’s fault.

Now all he needs to do is talk to Richie. He needs to man up, take responsibility for what he’s done, and make it clear that there needs to be boundaries within their friendship. That it’s better for both of them to stick to these boundaries, because Eddie is married and shouldn’t throw his marriage or his friendship with Richie away just because he’s going through a midlife crisis. And as Richie’s best friend, it’s also his responsibility not to drag him into said crisis. Richie deserves more than that.

It is a good idea in theory, but when he calls Richie a few weeks later, it doesn’t go exactly to plan. Richie answers the phone in this happy, excited voice, “Hey, Eds, good timing, I was just thinking about you,” and Eddie is already thrown for a loop.

“Really?”

“Yeah,” Richie says, and Eddie can’t help the way he smiles at the sound of Richie’s voice. “I was watching TV, and one of those medication commercials came on, you know, the ones that list off six billion side effects, and the voiceover guy sounded _just_ like you. For a second I thought the ghost of you was actually coming through my TV, like the Ring and shit. You’ve seen the Ring, right? Tell me you’ve seen the Ring, I will hate you if you say you haven’t seen the Ring. Eds, have you seen the Ring? Oh my God, you haven’t, have you?”

It’s so perfectly Richie that Eddie isn't able to stop himself as he murmurs, “I missed you.”

Eddie hears Richie take in a sharp breath, but he doesn’t say anything for what feels like an eternity. He can count on one hand the number of times Richie’s ever been speechless; this is one of them. Finally he speaks, his voice softer than usual. “I, uh, missed you too, man. What’s going on?”

“Nothing, I just…” Eddie knows that he needs to get hold of himself. He needs to calm down, think rationally, and just talk to Richie. Just talk to him, fix all of this, and go back to their normal. “You alone right now?”

“Always,” Richie says with a laugh, but there’s something sad about it, an undercurrent of loneliness bubbling up to the surface. Eddie tries to tell himself that he’s just looking too much into it, but something tells him he’s not. “You? You alone?”

“I can be.” The words are out of Eddie’s mouth before he can stop himself. He hears Richie gasp and a thrill settles in his stomach, which is ridiculous because they’re just going to talk, that’s all. “Give me a second.”

Myra is already asleep, but he goes into the downstairs bathroom anyway and locks the door. He’s so nervous his hands are shaking. “Okay,” he murmurs, sitting down on the ledge of the bathtub. “Sorry, I’m good, just had to...you know-”

“It’s okay.” Richie’s voice is low and soft. “It’s okay, I’m just. Surprised, I guess. Didn’t think we were gonna do this.”

“Do what?” No one ever said Eddie wasn’t an idiot.

“Oh fuck off, Eds, you know what I mean. I just figured it was one of those things, you know? Like, we just don’t talk about it and act like everything’s cool and normal and not, you know...like _this_.”

“Like what, Rich?”

“Dude, come _on_.” And there he is, defensive and petulant and stubborn and trying so, so hard to pretend he doesn’t care. Trying so hard to be someone he’s not. “You’re not fucking stupid. You know what I’m talking about, and I know what you’re gonna say, so. I guess just say it.”

“What the fuck does that mean?” Eddie asks. He’s almost offended by Richie’s assertion that he wants to just sweep all of this under the rug (and he knows he should, he knows that’s _exactly_ what he should do). “What do you think I want to say?”

“Eds-”

“No, Rich, tell me. What do you think I want to say?” He can hear Richie breathing heavily, and he hates this, he hates putting Richie in this situation, but it’s necessary. They have to talk about this, and they can’t just bullshit their way through it.

Richie laughs, brittle and thin. “Eddie, please, I know how this goes. This isn’t my first rodeo, okay? I’ve been here before, done that, got the shirt, spilled hot sauce on it, the whole nine yards. You’re not the first person who’s wanted to pretend that I...that _it_ never happened, so let’s just not, alright?”

This time, Eddie’s the one who’s speechless. Richie’s words hang in the air, the unsaid meaning behind them; that Richie has been in this position before, been intimate with someone who didn’t want to acknowledge it, didn’t want to acknowledge _him_. He’s been told before that being with him is a mistake that shouldn’t be repeated and never talked about it. He’s been told before that _he’s_ a mistake, and not just once. Many times, apparently enough times that he can’t bear to hear it again.

Eddie’s wondered a lot about the twenty-seven year gap where they forgot each other. He’s thought a lot about what Richie’s life was like beyond the glitz and glamour of B-list celebrity. He had noticed back in Derry that Richie didn’t mention a significant other, but hadn’t questioned it. But now he understands. Now he knows that Richie’s life was a lonely one, and he wonders how long it’s been that way. Was it after he left Derry? Or did it start before? Just how _long_ has Richie been alone?

“Sorry.” Eddie’s dragged out of his thoughts by the sound of Richie’s voice. Eddie can tell that he’s trying so, so hard to sound nonchalant, but Eddie knows better. He sounds vulnerable and scared, and Eddie hates himself for making Rich feel that way. He’s always known that Richie felt things, that he wasn’t the shallow caricature that he’s always pretended to be, but Eddie’s just now starting to understand the extent of it. “Just forget about it. It’s fine.”

“I can’t forget about it.” The words just slip out of Eddie’s mouth before he can stop them. He knows he shouldn’t say this, but he can’t let Richie think that there’s something wrong with him when there isn’t anything wrong with him. “Rich, I can’t forget about it. I don’t _wanna_ forget about it. About you.”

It’s like a bomb has gone off. Neither of them say anything for the longest time, like they’ve physically lost the ability to do so. Eddie’s heart is pounding so hard, he wouldn’t be surprised if Richie can hear it over the phone. Finally Richie breaks the silence, stuttering a little. “What...what do you mean?”

“I meant it when I said I missed you,” Eddie says. It’s true, he’s tried so hard in these past few weeks not to think about, but he can’t help it. He’s missed Richie so much, and not just for the past few weeks, but for the last twenty-seven years. He’s missed him so, so fucking much, he can’t stand it anymore. He knows all of this is wrong, but his entire _life_ has been wrong, and maybe this is one of those things that’s theoretically wrong, but feels fucking right. “I think about you all the fucking time.”

More silence. He can almost see Richie sitting there, mouth hanging open, eyebrows furrowed in that way they always do when he’s trying to process something. He feels like he’s going to puke, silently begging for Richie to say something, anything. The irony of actually wanting Richie to talk when he spent the entirety of their teenage years telling him to shut up isn’t lost on him.

Finally Richie speaks. “I think about you every fucking day,” he whispers. “Every minute, every hour.”

Eddie releases the breath he just now realizes he’s been holding. He starts rubbing one hand on his knee in an attempt to release all of the nervous energy building up inside him. And apparently Richie feels the same way, now that the box has been opened. “I think about you, what we’ve done. What...what I wanna do still. I know it’s fucked up, and I’m sorry, but I don’t wanna forget it, I don’t want you to forget it, cause I don’t want it to stop.”

“I don’t want it to stop, either.” That’s it, Eddie is possessed. He’s possessed by a demon of some sort, it’s the only explanation as to why the _fuck_ he just said that.

(He said it because it’s true. He said it because it’s true, he doesn’t want to stop, he wants _more_, he wants _Richie_, oh _fuck_…)

“Fuck, man, don’t say that,” Richie murmurs. “Please don’t fucking say that.”

“It’s true.” The box hasn’t just been opened, it’s been blown wide open, and now Eddie’s the one saying things that he has no business saying. “Fuck, it’s all I think about. When I’m at work, when I’m at home, when I’m sleeping, doesn’t matter, I can’t stop thinking about it.”

He hears Richie curse under his breath. “Are you thinking about it right now?”

All the blood in his body rushes straight to his dick at the sound of Richie’s voice, lower than he’s ever heard it before. He’s definitely thinking about it right now; about Richie’s hands, his mouth, his cock (Eddie can feel his face flush bright red at that). He’s thinking about how Richie feels against him, how warm he is, how thick and solid he is and how it feels so fucking good pressed against him. He’s thinking about how Richie would feel underneath him, and decides fuck it, he’s already going to Hell, might as well go out in style. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m thinking about it right now.”

“Fuck.” Richie groans, and it takes everything Eddie has not to undo his pants and starts jerking off right here. “Don’t say that, I can’t...I can’t fucking listen to you say shit like that and not-”

“What? Touch yourself?” Eddie starts toying with the fly of his slacks, playing with the button of his waistband. The heel of his hand grazes against his dick and he lets out a hiss. “Do it, Rich. I am.”

He’s never heard a more amazing sound than the sound of Richie moaning. It’s so deep it feels like it’s vibrating against his skin, and he gives up any semblance of self-control and undoes his pants. His eyes flutter shut when he presses his hand against himself and starts rubbing, slowly and teasingly. “You doing it?”

“Yeah,” Richie whispers. The picture in Eddie’s mind is crystal clear; he can see Richie sitting on his couch, jeans undone, legs spread, cupping himself over his boxers. The thought makes Eddie’s blood boil, and he starts rubbing himself a little harder. “Are you?”

“Yeah.” Eddie’s already panting and they’ve barely started. He still doesn’t know how they got from talking about ending their...thing to having phone sex, but here they are. “Yeah, I...I wish it was you doing it.”

Richie moans again; Eddie thinks he could spend the rest of his life listening to that sound alone. “Fuck, I wish I was there,” he says. “I’d...I’d do it any way you want it. Tell me how you want it, Eds.”

Eddie didn’t think it was possible for his dick to get any harder, but he’s proven wrong. He groans as he lifts his hips up just enough to pull his pants and boxer briefs down, hissing a little at the cold air hitting his cock, but it turns back into a groan when he starts stroking himself. “Start off slow,” he tells Richie. “Slow, but...but tight, you know?”

“Yeah, tight. Like you...like you’re fucking my hand, right?” From the way Richie’s breathing, Eddie knows he’s jacking off, too. He can hear it in every syllable Richie says, shaky and breathless. “You can fuck my hand, Eds. You can fuck any part of me you want.”

“Fuck,” Eddie gasps, mental images bombarding his mind of Richie bent over, Richie on his back, Richie above him on his lap. He strokes his cock faster and harder, thinking about how good Richie would feel, how hot and tight he’d be, and holy _fuck_, that is a thought that Eddie has never, ever thought he would think. He’s never had this kind of thought about Myra, or any of his ex-flings, or any other girl he’s ever tried to masturbate to. But thinking about fucking Richie is so easy, he doesn’t have to try at all to picture it. “Goddamn, Rich, that’s...that’s…”

“I know,” Richie moans. “But I want it. I want it so fucking bad, I’d sell my kidneys, your mom’s kidneys, my bank teller’s kidneys, if you’d just fuck me. I want you to fuck me, Eds, I want you to fuck me so fucking bad, man.”

Fuck, Richie’s words are going straight to his dick; he’s never been one to fantasize or have a lot of kinks, but listening to Richie say these things, hearing that Richie wants to be the one to take it, he wants to be the one that’s fucked...he realizes how much he wants that, too. How much he wants to be in control, the one to give, the one to conquer. Maybe it’s because he’s spent so much of life being controlled by others, that’s why it sounds so appealing to him. “Fuck, Rich,” he moans, and it’s all he can say. “Fuck, fuck…”

And he thinks Richie knows what this is doing to him, because he keeps saying it, over and over again. “I want you to fuck me, Eds, please, I’ll fucking...I’ll fucking beg if I have to, I want you to fuck me, tell me you’re gonna fuck me next time you see me…”

“I’ll fuck you the next time I see you.” A sharp, tight coil of heat shoots its way from his feet all the way up to his gut, and he knows he’s not going to last much not longer. But it feels too good to stop; he starts babbling nonsense, rubbing his thumb over the head of his cock over and over again. “I’ll fuck you, Rich. I swear, I’ll fuck you, I want to, I want to, _I want to_.”

“Eddie,” Richie whines and holy shit, Eddie’s done for. He strokes himself once, twice, and he comes, hard but quietly. His body shakes and spasms, but he bites his lip to contain the noises he just wants to scream out loud. He’s just loud enough for Richie to hear, cause then Richie is moaning, “I can hear you, I can hear you, fuck Eddie, I can _hear_ you…” And then Richie’s voice is muffled, like he’s pressed his phone against his shirt to mask the sound, but Eddie can still hear him. He hears Richie moan and cry out, and he imagines Richie coming all over his hand, hot and needy. The thought makes his dick twitch.

They spend the next few seconds trying to catch their breaths; Richie is making soft little noises, residual moans, like it almost hurts. It’s hot and makes Eddie blush. He can hear Richie laugh and mutter, “Fucking hell,” under his breath.

Eddie laughs, too. “Yeah. Fucking hell,” he repeats. In this moment, he comes to the following conclusions:

One: Having phone sex with his childhood best friend is definitely one of those things that he had never dreamed of doing before.

Two: He really, _really_ likes having phone sex with his childhood best friend.

“Soooo…” Richie interrupts his thoughts. His voice cracks a little, like he’s not sure if he wants to ask, but knows he has to. “So what now?”

The words come out of Eddie’s mouth before he can stop himself. “I meant what I said, Rich. Next time I see you.”

“When?” Eddie hears the hopeful tilt in Richie’s voice, can almost see his eyes wide behind his glasses. “When are we gonna…”

“Next week,” he answers. “I’ll figure something out, but count on next week.”

It turns out that for once, he’s _not_ lying.


	4. IV. But it's so damn easy making love to you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I know I'm terrible for not updating for two months, BUT LET ME EXPLAIN, OKAY? I have been working on this chapter during this entire two month span. Yes, that's right. I HAVE been working on it. In fact, I've rewritten this chapter four times.
> 
> You read that right. I HAVE REWRITTEN THIS FOUR TIMES.
> 
> I don't know, y'all. It was going well, then I decided the tone was wrong, then decided the tone was wrong again another three times. It's been haunting me every day until today, I sat down and finally went, "Self, you need to put on your adult pants and GET THIS DONE. STOP BEING A SELF-CRITICAL SELF-LOATHING ASSHOLE. JUST WRITE IT AS IT COMES, ACCEPT IT, AND MOVE THE FUCK ON." So I did.
> 
> So I apologize for the delay and I apologize if the tone is off because this is a conglomerated version of the four different versions. But the good news is that I now have a clearer direction on where the story is going to go, so this should, IN THEORY, help with the whole delay thing.
> 
> ALSO THIS IS THE CHAPTER WITH SOME SEX, SO THERE'S THAT TOO.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who has left such lovely comments and have been patient with me. Please let me know your thoughts, good or bad. I can take it.

It turns out that while it seems easy to _ plan _ an affair, it is absolutely not easy, not at all, not one little bit. It isn’t to say that Eddie expects it to be a piece of cake, with all of the logistics falling right into place. He expects some complications, he expects some issues, but he doesn’t expect just how much _ work _ goes into setting up an affair (it sounds horrible to word it that way, he knows this, but there’s no other way to explain it).  
  
Eddie thinks the movies are to blame; thanks a lot, _Fatal Attraction_ and _Unfaithful _and _Closer._

The first complication is deciding how long the trip should be. There’s no way he can swing a whole week, not with all the time he’s had to take off of work this year, and there is no way in hell Myra will let him go out of town without her for that long. He doesn’t want to waste money on a one or two day trip, so he decides to fly out on Friday morning, and come back late Sunday. He’ll tell his bosses that he’s taking Myra on a weekend trip, and tell Myra that he has to fly out and meet with the client he previously went to see. This way, he only has to take one day off work, and he can justify a working weekend to Myra. 

Of course, it does not work out exactly as he hopes it would. He goes into work the following Monday and asks for the early weekend, and his boss blows a gasket. He’s still peeved with Eddie for how much time he’s had to take off in the last year. He’s a little more sympathetic when Eddie says it’s for Myra; everyone at work has _ met _ Myra, they all _ know _ Myra, and they understand that you do _ not _ piss Myra Kaspbrak off by denying her husband time off to spend with her.  
  
But his boss has to go to _ his _ boss, though, and he doesn’t get the okay until Wednesday night that his time off is approved. He freaks out a little, because it throws a wrench in his plans, and if there’s one thing Eddie has a hard time with, it’s when things don’t go exactly to plan.  
  
However, a second complication pops up, and it’s Myra. It’s not that he thought he could just tell her he’s going out of state for the weekend on such short notice and her not get pissed off. They’ve been married for ten years, he knows her like the back of his hand, and he knows she’s gonna lose her shit. But he’s not expecting the way she loses her shit; instead of the usual high-pitched shrieking and tears that lasts well into the night, she softly, quietly asks him to sit down, so they can _ talk_.  
  
It immediately sets him on edge, and he sits there warily, waiting for the shoe to drop and for the crying and screaming to start. And her eyes are watering when she speaks, but she doesn’t shout or yell. Instead she keeps her voice level, calm, and it’s honestly more unnerving than the typical screaming. She tells him she understands that this is for work, but she doesn’t want him to go for a variety of reasons. And when she lists off those reasons, he finds that he can’t argue with her.

Because when she says that she’s scared every time he leaves that he’s not going to come back, it’s _ valid_. She says that he’s been working so much lately, which is true, and she’s worried he’s overdoing it, which is a logical conclusion to make, considering earlier this year, he almost _ died_. She says that this has been the toughest year of their lives, and that’s the fucking _ truth_, and she feels like they haven’t spent much time together lately, which...is also true. Except for the part where she thinks it’s work that’s keeping them apart, when it’s really not work at all.

And while there’s a part of him that feels stifled, there’s also a part of him that hears what she’s saying, and thinks it isn’t that unreasonable. Of _ course _she feels this way; she loves him and wants to be with him. And yes, there are times when he doesn’t like the way she shows her love. Sometimes it makes him feel like a doll in a glass case, but she doesn’t mean to. Cause the thing is, he’s not the only one whose parents did a number on him. Myra’s mother reminds him so much of his own mother, it’s freaky. And her father, her father just lets her mother yell and scream and fret and make everything six billion times more difficult than it has to be. This is what she knows, this is how she’s been taught to love. How can he be angry when she’s just trying to show him she loves him?

And he almost calls the whole thing off, because she’s upset, and he feels guilty about ignoring her wishes when she’s trying to be a mature adult for once. But every time he opens his mouth to say yes, she’s right, he’ll stay home, he thinks of Richie, and he feels even _ more _guilty. Because he knows Richie wouldn’t react like Myra; there’d be no theatrics, no pomp and circumstance. He’d say he understands, laugh it off, and never bring it up again. But he’d also find excuses to distance himself, and slip away again, just like he did 27 years ago. Only this time, Eddie would only have himself to blame and not ancient alien magic.

Ultimately, it’s the thought of losing Richie again that takes precedence over Myra’s concerns. Eddie stands his ground, tells Myra that he has to go this weekend, but next weekend they can have a Date Night, and they can do whatever she wants and he won’t bitch and complain about it. It seems to appease her for now.

Once those problems are taken care of, he thinks it’ll be easier. Except no, it’s not, because now all he can think about is what’s going to happen during this trip. More specifically, all he can think about is the sex that’s supposed to happen, and predictably, he is freaking himself the fuck out about it.

They haven’t actually talked since the night they had phone sex, although they have been texting. And Richie hasn’t brought up any of the things he said that night, but he doesn’t have to, because literally every five seconds, Eddie thinks about it. He thinks about it and he works himself into mini panic attacks. Sex has always been an issue for him, but it’s even scarier now because he’s going to have sex with a _ man_.

It brings up a whole litany of issues and insecurities and questions that he hasn’t thought about in a long, long time. Not since he was nine, ten years old and the pastor at church spoke of dirty men going to Hell. Not since he was twelve, thirteen years old and kids at school called him names. Not since he was almost killed by a clown disguised as a leper, who offered him blowjobs for money. Not since he was fourteen, fifteen years old, and he’d watch TV with his mother and feel funny as a newscaster recounted the latest stats on AIDS deaths. Not since he was sixteen, and he and his mother moved away from Derry, and he forgot who he was. 

Even now, he doesn’t know the answers to these questions. He doesn’t know if he’s gay, bisexual, curious, or what. Hell, he doesn’t know what Richie is, either. Clearly he’s not straight, and Eddie feels a little stupid if he thinks about it for too long. He had known what kids in school said about Richie, he had known what was written about him in the bathroom stalls (and had selfishly, selfishly felt a little tiny bit grateful that it hadn’t been his name on those stalls instead). But he had honestly never given those rumors much thought. Richie had been the kid who spent the entire 80’s making jokes about banging people’s moms, who during the summer of ‘92 dragged Eddie to the Aladdin so he could drool over Michelle Pfeiffer in Batman Returns. This is the guy who became rich and famous talking to strangers about fucking women (which now that he thinks about it, _ way to overcompensate, Rich_, although he would never tell him that). He feels terrible, but Eddie had never questioned, not even when he had been briefly questioning himself, that Rich was anything other than straight.

And it’s stupid, and probably terrible and close-minded and all those things, but not knowing what to call himself and Rich is driving him insane, because he is a literal person. He needs labels to help him identify things. He needs labels so things make sense and so he can categorize them accordingly. He needs labels so that things are real to him. But this...he doesn’t know where to even start.

And that’s just the existential crisis. There’s also the fact that he has very, very little experience, and he’s terrified that he’s going to suck at this. It’s not like he knows what to do; he’s only ever had sex with women. Sex with men is a whole other ball game, and he’s scared it’s going to be obvious. He’s scared that he’s going to touch Richie the wrong way, put things where he’s not supposed to or something or worse, actually hurt Richie. The best case scenario would be that Richie laughs at him and roasts him for the rest of their lives for it. 

He tries not to think about the worst case scenario, which would be disappointing Richie and him deciding it (_Eddie) _isn’t worth it. 

He doesn’t know what the fuck he’s doing. He feels like he needs a shirt that says this, or maybe a tattoo across his forehead announcing it. 

He feels a lot of things that week, anxiety and worry and guilt and shame. But the things he feels when he thinks about Richie are just a little stronger than the bad shit. Things like the excitement and the anticipation and the fucking _ need _that’s burning in his veins. He feels like he’s fifteen again, burning like a livewire at just the thought of being with someone. 

But of course, because he wouldn’t be Eddie Kaspbrak if he didn’t, he goes back and forth between those good and bad feelings. There’s about six or seven instances during his flight out to Los Angeles that he thinks he’s going to puke from the nerves. Once when he’s standing in line for baggage check, once again when he’s going through security, once when he’s waiting to board, twice once the plane takes off, and two more times before they land...and that’s just to the layover at O'Hare. There’s a moment when he’s waiting for his connecting flight where he thinks that maybe, maybe this isn’t a good idea. Maybe he should just turn right back around and go home, end this madness now, before it’s too late.

He checks his phone while waiting to board, and he has a text from Richie that says, “Can’t wait for you to see the giant ass sign I made for you. You’re gonna kill me.” It’s followed by a winking emoji, then a heart emoji. It makes him smile (a real one, he can feel it in the way his cheeks stretch and his nose rises), and he boards his connecting flight with a renewed sense of purpose.

And of course, Richie is right when he said that Eddie was going to kill him for the sign. First of all, it’s ridiculous that Richie even brought a sign with him, it’s not like Eddie wouldn’t be able to recognize him in a crowd for fuck’s sake. But this is Richie, and he will never pass up an opportunity to antagonize Eddie. And secondly, it’s what he’s written on the sign that’s just the piece de resistance. 

_ Uh-Oh (Eds) Spaghetti-O! _

It might just be the dumbest thing Eddie’s ever seen in his life. He’s pretty sure he’s never smiled wider, either.

And the way _ Richie’s _smiling at him? It’s bright and takes up the entirety of his face, his eyes crinkling at the corners. He looks happy, and it makes Eddie feel a certain kind of way, one that he can’t quite place. 

“You couldn’t help yourself, could you?” he says as he approaches, shaking his head. 

Richie meets him halfway, laughing. He sounds so young when he laughs, _ really _laughs. “Did you expect anything less?”

“Of course not.” As soon as they reach other, they’re hugging, and Eddie hopes it just looks like two friends reconnecting after some time apart.

Pulling away takes more effort than he would have thought.  
  


In between all of the freaking out and panicking he’s been doing this week, Eddie’s been wondering about what would happen once they were alone together again. He’s imagined so many things; he’s imagined throwing Richie up against the wall and putting his hands all over him. He’s imagined the two of them kissing and groping their way over to the couch. He’s imagined them not even making it to the bedroom before they took off their clothes. He’s imagined a _ lot _of things.

Here’s what actually happens:

They get to the house, and both of them are nervous as shit. Richie gives him a tour of the house like he hasn’t been here before. They go into his bedroom, and stand around for a few minutes while Eddie takes in every picture on the wall, and Richie tells him the stories behind each one. It’s beyond awkward and neither of them know what to do about it.

It’s like this for a few minutes before Eddie finally thinks fuck it. He sits down on Richie’s bed and pats the seat next to him. “Sit down, dude. You’re making me nervous.”

“Fuck you. You’re always nervous,” Richie snaps in response, no heat in his voice. But he sits down, close enough that their knees are touching. He bounces his leg, like he’s vibrating with energy and has to get it out somehow. He looks around at everything, the wall, the floor, the bedspread, everywhere except at Eddie. “Your mom should have gotten a shot of Xanax instead of an epidural when she had you.”

Eddie smiles despite himself. There’s something comforting about Richie falling back on his failsafe, jokes about his mother. But he also understands, now at least, the jokes are a smokescreen. Something Richie uses to hide in plain sight, and he doesn’t _ have _to. So instead of firing back an insult of his own, he reaches out and takes Richie’s hand. He intertwines their fingers together and looks up at Richie, and smiles when Richie stops bouncing his leg. He watches Richie stare at their intertwined hands with something like reverence. “Oh,” he murmurs to himself. “Okay.”

“Now who’s nervous?” Eddie says, his voice soft and teasing. 

“I never said I wasn’t,” Richie replies, glancing up at Eddie and looking away just as quickly. Almost like he’s afraid to look, like if he does, he’ll make Eddie uncomfortable. Like he has to make himself and his emotions smaller so they’re easier for Eddie to digest. Like if Eddie can see how much he’s feeling right now, it will scare him off and he’ll run away. 

Eddie remembers looking at Richie when they were kids, and thinking that Richie wasn’t a kid like the rest of them, but a goddamn _ supernova._ He burned so bright, so hot that everything else pales in comparison. He belonged in the sky because the _ world _ was too small for _ him_. But the thing about supernovas is that they burn out. They burn out, explode, and turn into dust. He looks at Richie right now, and wonders if it’s possible for stars to be reborn. 

“I’m nervous,” Richie whispers. “I’m so fucking nervous, Eds.”

“I am too,” Eddie whispers back. He lifts their hands up, and kisses the back of Richie’s, a soft, gentle press of his lips. He shudders a little when Richie gasps and closes his eyes like he’s savoring it. “But it’s okay.” He pauses for a moment to let the words sink in, and says it again because he knows Richie needs to hear it. “It’s _ okay_.”

Eddie realizes that it’s now or never; this is the moment where they have to decide whether or not to cross that line. They’ll never be able to go back to the way things were, they’ll never be able to pretend again. The only question, who is going to be the one to do it.

Of course, it’s Richie. Richie, who swears that _ Eddie _is the brave one, crosses the line. He leans in, lets go of Eddie’s hand, and kisses him.

Historically, Eddie has never liked kissing. He’s always thought it was gross, what with all the saliva and bacteria. Sometimes it felt like worms being shoved against his mouth, instead of a pair of lips, cold and slimy and wiggly. He’s always felt trapped, like bugs are crawling all over his skin and he’s being consumed. But this is the complete opposite of that. It’s soft and sweet. Richie’s lips are warm and smooth, just wet enough that they can slide together easily, but not so much that he feels like he’s drowning in spit. He feels warm and tingly, like someone’s running a feather across his skin. He feels like he can _ breathe_.

He pulls back to catch his breath, and when he opens his eyes, Richie’s staring at him. It makes him self-conscious, and he manages to breath out a “What?” Richie answers him by grabbing his face with both hands and kissing him again, this time hard and needy and oh fuck-

It’s _ amazing_. His stomach drops, and fireworks shoot off behind his eyelids, and fuck, is _ this _ what it’s supposed to be like? Is _ this _ is how it’s supposed to feel? If so, Eddie isn’t just fucked, he’s fucking _ doomed_. Game fucking _ over._ He’s _ never _going to be able to stop now.

So he doesn’t. He puts his hands on Richie’s face and kisses back just as hard, just as needy. Richie lets out a groan that screams, _ finally, finally, thank God, finally. _ As soon as he parts his lips, Eddie slides his tongue into his mouth and oh, it should feel gross but it feels _ good_. Richie’s mouth is hot and his breath is hot against Eddie’s face, and Eddie is literally tingling everywhere. His arms, his legs, his hands, his feet, his whole _ body _is tingling.

The kiss deepens. He loses track of how long it lasts, he’s so wrapped in Richie. Richie’s mouth, his hands, his moans. He yields to everything Eddie does; he lets go of Eddie’s face so Eddie can hold his neck and control the pace. He opens his mouth eagerly every time Eddie touches his tongue against his lips, as if asking for permission. He sighs every time Eddie licks the inside of his mouth or runs his tongue over his teeth. _ I want it_, he remembers Richie saying last week. _ I want it so fucking bad. _

Eddie breaks the kiss to catch his breath, only for Richie to whine in protest; he sounds wrecked already, and just the thought of Richie this worked up so soon makes him feel like his brain is short circuiting. “Ssh, ssh, it’s okay,” he finds himself murmuring. “Scoot up for a second.” 

Richie does exactly that, scooting into the middle of the bed and leaning back on his elbows, just watching him. The look on his face makes him shiver, like he’s just waiting for Eddie to tell him what to do. It makes Eddie feel in control, powerful, like he’s the only one who can give Richie what he wants. He crawls up to Richie, putting his hands on his knees to push them open. He slides in between them and lays down on top of him, one forearm braced on the bed, the other cupping Richie’s jaw as he kisses him again. 

Richie wraps his legs around Eddie’s waist, and they’re pressed groin to groin, and this is familiar. It’s familiar and good and Eddie goes from half-hard to fully hard in record time. They keep kissing and start to grind against each other, slow at first, both of them groaning into each other’s mouths. Eddie moves the hand he had on Richie’s jaw and reaches down, grabbing his thigh. It makes Richie tighten his legs around his waist, and Eddie has to break the kiss in order to breathe. But he keeps up the pace of his hips, opens his eyes, and looks down at Richie. He watches Richie’s eyes flutter open and closed with pleasure, and a surge of pride rushes through him; he’s doing that. _ He’s giving Richie pleasure. _

Richie surges up and kisses him again, long and deep while his hands slide between them. He’s frantic as he undoes his jeans, scrambling to push them down off his hips. Eddie pulls back just enough so he can get his own pants off, just as desperate. They’re a mess of limbs as they both get their pants off and kick them to the side, and their shirts are next. Richie settles back down, propped up on his elbows, still in his boxers (gray flannel; Eddie is surprised, he had expected cartoon characters or llamas), legs spread. “This is fucking crazy,” he whispers. “Is this even fucking real?”

Eddie smiles, despite the twinge of sadness he feels at how incredulous Richie sounds, and he takes a moment to just look at him. When they were kids, Richie had been gangly as fuck, all limbs, all sharp angles. But now he’s both soft and sharp, and Eddie likes it. He likes how broad his shoulders are and the light dusting of freckles on them. He likes how broad his chest is without being too ripped. He likes how the broadness of his body thins out and tapers at his waist and hips. He likes how soft his stomach is and how thick his thighs are. He likes how long his legs are, he likes how strong his jawline is, he likes _ everything _about Richie’s body. 

And he’s so busy admiring Richie that he doesn’t realize that Richie is staring at him just as intently. He’s caught off guard when Richie puts his hands on his hips, and literally has to hold his breath at the feel of Richie’s thumbs, rubbing at the skin above his boxer briefs (burgundy; he’s always liked shades of red). “You have G.I. Joe lines,” Richie murmurs.

“What?” Eddie laughs.

“These here.” Richie trails his thumbs lower, sliding underneath the waistband of Eddie’s underwear. “Muscles that look like a V, you know? Like a V going straight to your dick.” He raises an eyebrow, and Eddie has to admit, he likes this look on him, too. “Didn’t you notice them on your G.I. Joe dolls?”

“Can’t say I ever looked at my G.I. Joe dolls’ dicks,” Eddie replies, trying so hard not to laugh. This conversation is ridiculous. “Not surprised you did, though.”

“Touche,” is all Richie says. They grin at each other, and it soothes Eddie, reminds him that yes, this is new and scary and exciting, but it’s Richie. It’s Richie and as long as they are together, they’re okay.

But that feeling goes away as soon as Richie starts pushing his underwear down. Fear and anxiety crawl up from his stomach into his chest, and he pulls back. He leans back and bites the inside of his cheek and tries to remember to breathe, breathe, it’s okay, just breathe. “I don’t,” he tries to say. His voice is clenching up on him. “I’ve never.”

The grin slides from Richie’s face, and he just stares at Eddie. Eyes wide and solemn behind his glasses, the look on his face is soft and gentle and serious. “I know,” he says. Fuck, even his voice is soft, and Eddie thinks he’s blushing, warmth sliding up into his face, across his shoulders and down his back. “I know. It’s alright. You don’t...we can just work up to it, yeah? There’s other things that don’t...here, lemme show you. Can I show you?”

_ Can I show you? _ The words replay in Eddie’s head, and yes, _ yes_, Rich can show him. He can show him anything he wants, and Eddie nods, unable to speak. 

He lets Richie push him off his lap, and sits back down on the mattress. He watches as Richie scoots off the bed and onto the floor. A jolt of heat courses through his stomach at the sight of Richie on his knees; his tongue feels like it’s stuck to the roof of his mouth as it occurs to him, _ he’s going to blow me. _ He can count on one hand the number of times anyone’s blown him. He’s never been into it; it just seems too complicated, and all the bacteria, it’s fucking dirty, and he’s always thought it was a little degrading, honestly. Myra had agreed with him and it wasn’t something that came up in their bedroom often.

And even with Richie, it still feels dirty. But it’s a _ good _ kind of dirty, the kind of dirty that makes Eddie shudder. He thinks he likes the thought of Richie not caring that it’s dirty. He thinks he likes the thought of Richie liking it because it’s dirty, of _ Richie _being dirty. 

“Lift up,” Richie says. Eddie does so wordlessly, and holds his breath while Richie pulls his underwear down. He hisses a little at both the feel of the fabric dragging down and the air hitting his dick. He feels a little queasy, nerves, it’s always his fucking nerves, and he prepares himself for the inevitable dick jokes. But when he looks at Richie, Richie’s not laughing or grinning. He’s staring at him like he’s _ starving_. His eyes are half-lidded and he licks the top of his teeth. “Fuck, dude,” he murmurs. “Fuck.”

Eddie raises one eyebrow, and has a smartass comment on the tip of his tongue. But that all goes away when Richie wraps his hand around Eddie’s dick. And when he leans forward, and slowly, slowly licks the tip? Any comments or thoughts or one-liners he may have had completely die.

Cause this? This is surreal. This is surreal and crazy and surely not happening, surely Richie Tozier, his childhood best friend, didn’t just put his mouth on Eddie’s dick. But he did. Richie Tozier didn’t just put his mouth on Eddie’s dick, he’s now running his tongue along the shaft, swirling it around the head before sliding back down, slow and steady. His tongue is wet and firm and and holy fucking shit, this is nuts. This is insane. This feels _ so fucking good _ Eddie wants to fucking _ die_.

Richie lifts his head; his lips are wet, too. “You good?” he asks. He’s panting a little.

“Yeah.” Eddie nods. “I’m good. I’m good.”

And when Richie lowers his head, wraps a hand around the base of Eddie’s cock, and slides it into his mouth? Eddie’s _ more _ than good. He’s ascended into another plane. Richie’s mouth is warm and wet and tight. His eyes are closed and he’s bobbing his head forward and back, breathing through his nose. He’s done this before, and the thought of him with anyone else doesn’t sit right with Eddie. _ That’s jealousy_, a little voice in his head tells him. _ But it’s alright, cause it’s yours now. He’s yours now. _

The thought shocks him. But there’s a part of him that revels in it, a deep, dark part of him that knows it and wants it and won’t have it any other way. Richie _ is _his now.

He watches Richie hollow his cheeks to make it tighter. He watches Richie rock and back forth and take more and more of him in. He reaches out and puts his hand on the back of Richie’s head, and he feels the low moan in Richie’s throat, vibrating against him. He curls his fingers into Richie’s hair, surprised by how clean it feels (he remembers Maggie making cracks about “teen spirit” being rank, and all but dragging Richie into the bathroom). It seems like Richie likes it, and Eddie makes a mental note of it; _ mess with his hair, he likes having his hair messed with_.

It seems like Richie likes sucking dick, too. He’s making this soft, little noises in his mouth, which makes Eddie throb. He keeps taking more and more, rocking forward on his knees. He slides his free hand up Eddie’s thigh, and starts to play with his balls. That almost makes Eddie come off the bed; he moans like he’s surprised (he is, he didn’t know he liked that), and it makes Richie stop. He pulls back off and looks up at Eddie. “You okay?” he pants.

Eddie nods. “Do that again,” he says, his voice rough. He’s once again surprised when Richie just does as he says, lowers his head and goes right back to blowing him and stroking him. A little thrill shoots through Eddie as he wonders if Richie is submissive. And if he is, how far can they go with that.

_ Wait. What. No. What the fuck? _

He can’t believe he’s thinking these things. Where the fuck are these _ thoughts _coming from? He’s never wondered about things like whether someone is submissive and what someone’s kinks are (fuck, he’s actually using the word kinks, since when did that word end up in his vocabulary). He’s never been like this before. He needs to calm the fuck down and stop thinking this kind of shit, it’s...it’s weird and wrong and he needs to fucking cool it.

Thankfully, his mind goes blank when Richie starts to fucking _ hum_, and all he can think about is the white-hot pleasure. It starts in his feet and creeps up his legs, all the way up to his arms and the back of his neck. It feels like his brain is leaking out of his ears, and he starts thrusting his hips up without even knowing it. He’s moaning, too, the sounds slipping from his lips on their own accord. The pressure is building, and building, and he thinks if he doesn’t come soon, he’s going to die. “Fuck,” he grits through his teeth. “Fuck, Rich. Fuck, it’s....you’re...oh, _ oh _...”

Vaguely Eddie thinks that maybe Richie needs a break. His face is red, and surely his jaw and neck hurt. But Richie _ doesn’t _stop. He keeps licking and stroking and fondling Eddie, he keeps moaning around his cock. And Eddie can feel it coming, and tries to warn Richie because coming in his mouth? That’s just degrading. “Stop, stop, I’m gonna come, I’m gonna come.”

Again, Richie doesn’t stop. He keeps Eddie’s dick in his mouth, and when Eddie comes, fast and sudden, trembling and shuddering and trying so hard not to scream, Richie swallows. He’s fucking _ swallowing_, and Eddie just watches, pleasure rising and falling over him as Richie’s throat bobs up and down. He can’t get it all, though, and Eddie feels a dark, hot flash of shame as he thinks, _ My come is on his lips. _

It’s fucking gross, he feels like an asshole. There’s also a tiny part of him that likes it and thinks _ good, good, he knows, he knows he’s mine now. _

Eddie is trying to remember to breathe when Richie finally pulls back. He wipes his lips with the back of his hand and shoves his boxers down. As soon as they’re down and his cock is out, he’s jerking himself off. One hand on his dick, the other on the mattress in front of him, like he needs the support. “Sorry, sorry, I just, I gotta…” he’s panting. “Fuck, that was so fucking hot, Eddie…”

Eddie can feel himself blushing. But as much as he wants to fall back into the bed and lay down, he doesn’t. He wants to get Richie off, and even though he doesn’t think he can do what Rich did, he needs to do something. He leans forward, and tries to push Richie’s hand out of the way so he can take over. “Here…”

But Richie doesn’t budge. He actually pushes Eddie back, and doesn’t let him touch him. “I got it,” he insists. “I got it, don’t worry, I got it.”

If Eddie was thinking clearly, he would see what is really going on. But right now, his brain is liquefied goo, and all he can do is watch. He watches Richie stroke himself, taking the way he flicks his wrist, how tight he clenches his fist around his dick. He watches and takes notes so that next time, he can do it for Rich.  
  


But later, he _ will _think about this. He will think about Richie apologizing as he jerks off. He will think about Richie not letting him touch him, and he will continue to think about it when it becomes a pattern. And it will fill him with a weird, uneasy feeling that haunts him not only during this weekend together, but for a long, long time after it, too.


	5. V. I need to feel your touch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why hello. It's been a long time. Let me try to explain.
> 
> For a while, I wasn't sure what to do with this chapter. I outlined a ton of shit, wrote a lot of snippets, wrote a lot of beginnings. I just couldn't gather it all together and make it work for the longest time. I also had a bunch of Real Life Bullshit to deal with, shit that I'm not going to bore anyone with. But trust me when I say this was some pretty heavy duty shit. It's been a weird, weird time in my life lately. So I wasn't exactly thinking about this story while I tried to figure out what the fuck was going on.
> 
> But that's passed. Things are getting better. My life is becoming more stable. And so, I was finally able to sit down, think about what needed to happen in this chapter, and finally make it all gel together.
> 
> I want to thank everyone who has reached out to me about this story. Whether it be in kudos or comments on Ao3, mentions and recommendations on Tumblr and Discord, artwork created based on the story. I've been so humbled by all the support I've received. Seriously, I've been in various fandoms for a long time, and this one has some of the sweetest, most encouraging people. Y'all are the true MVPs.
> 
> I also want to give a special thanks to brainjuicey on Tumblr, who has been so wonderful to me. From the encouragement to the artwork to guiding me through how to join Discord, I just want to say thank you.
> 
> Unfortunately, not a lot of sexytime in this one. Lots of sadness, though. Please feel free to leave comments, kudos, thoughts, critiques, even just hellos. I'm grateful for any of it. <3

The next few weeks feel like a fever dream. Despite the physical distance between them, they find ways to get even closer. Eddie learns things about himself that he never thought about before; he learns things about Richie that he never knew existed. He learns things about the two of them _ together_, and it’s nothing short of a _ revelation_.

They talk almost every day, whether by text or phone call. Throughout Eddie’s work day, Richie sends him literal soliloquies about _ his _day, going on about everything from his schedule to recapping the latest battle between his two neighbors, who have been fighting about each other’s dogs shitting in their yards for the past six years now. He sends Eddie screenshots of traffic jams on the 10, complete with gun emojis. He keeps Eddie up to date about everything that’s going on in his day, tells him when he’s going to be in a meeting with his manager, when he’s working, whenever he’s not available, just in case Eddie tries to get hold of him and can’t. He says it’s because he doesn’t want Eddie to freak out and call the cops to do a wellness check on him, but Eddie knows better.

It’s very sweet. At first, it surprised him, even though it shouldn’t have. He’s always known that Richie is a lot nicer than people gave him credit for, but it is still surprising, how considerate he is. He’s really, _ really _considerate.

Another example of how considerate Richie is; he doesn’t send Eddie any racy texts or pictures during the day. He waits until Eddie’s home from work for that.

(Which Eddie appreciates; he would just about _die _if he was ever in the middle of a meeting and turned on his phone to a picture of Richie’s dick.)

(Which isn’t to say that Eddie doesn’t appreciate the dick pics. The amount of dick pics and videos of Richie jerking off he has on his phone is probably worrisome by now. This is one of those things he learns about himself; he _ likes _watching Richie touch himself.)

(He has the most _ incredible _ video of Richie in bed, wearing nothing but sweatpants, palming himself over said pants. The phone is angled just right so that Eddie can only see up to his jawline, and the way he moans is fucking _ obscene_. Eddie has to wear his headphones every time he rewatches it, which he does, over and over again.)

At night, the conversations take a drastic turn from traffic updates and meeting recaps. Sometimes it’s just phone sex, usually late at night after Myra’s gone to bed. Sometimes they FaceTime, whenever Myra’s working late and not due to be home until after nine. Sometimes it’s quick, and sometimes they can draw it out; that’s Eddie’s favorite, when they can take their time and really get into it. He likes to start off slow, tease Richie a little bit, make him wait a little bit before touching himself. That’s another thing he learns about himself; he likes to be in control. He likes telling Richie what to do, and he learns pretty quickly that Richie likes it, too. 

But despite talking every day, they’ve also developed a schedule of sorts when it comes to seeing each other in person. The phone calls are good, but Eddie finds himself craving more every time they get off the phone. So they’ve been alternating flying out to each other every couple of weeks, Eddie on weekends, Richie during the week. Eddie will take an extended lunch, or leave work early whenever Richie's in town. He’s been out to New York more times than Eddie’s been to Los Angeles, and it makes Eddie feel a little guilty, but Richie insists it’s not a big deal; it’s just easier for Rich to get away for a bit than it is for Eddie, so it makes sense for him to fly to New York more.

And while he can tell that Myra isn’t pleased with how often he’s not at home lately, she hasn’t come out and said anything directly. She’ll make comments here and there about how they’re working him to death, but that’s about it. 

He knows that she wants to say something, though. Sometimes she looks at him a certain way, and he can see the unasked questions in her eyes. _ What is going on? Why do you not want to be here anymore? Aren’t I enough for you, Eddie? _

Maybe he’s just imagining it. Maybe it’s just his guilty conscience.

(Whatever it is, it’s still easier than the other things he’s heard in his head before.

_ Where are you going, sweetie? _

_ What are you looking for, Eddie? _)

Regardless, Eddie decides that if Myra isn’t going to bring it up, then he isn’t either. If he were honest, the silence and the distance is kind of nice. Relieving, in a way. It’s such an asshole thing to say, he knows, but it’s true. He’s not going to sugarcoat it or try to make excuses for himself; it is objectively shitty to be happy about the distance between him and his wife.

But then, he’s always been selfish. Everyone’s always told him so (and that’s the thing; if one person tells you something, it’s a one time thing. If two people tell you something, it’s a coincidence. If it turns into three or four or five, then there’s only one common denominator, and that is _ you_). So yes, he is a shitty person, but this is not brand new information, so it is what it is. 

Because the only other alternative is to stop doing what he’s doing and that...well. He doesn’t want to do _ that_.

He knows it can’t last forever. It shouldn’t last forever. He knows that at some point, whatever this is with Richie is going to have to stop. But for now, he’s just going to try to enjoy it for as long as he can (cause there are so few, very few things in life he’s enjoyed).

The guilt is easier to ignore when he and Richie are together. The instant they’re together, it’s like he’s stepped into back in time, and he’s a teenager again, feeling all these new feelings that he didn’t feel the first time around. Every time they kiss, every time they touch each other, he feels like he’s on fire. Fuck, sometimes all Richie has to do is just _ look _ at him, and it’s like a flip switches inside him. A constant chorus in his head, screaming _ more, more, want more, need more, take more, take it all. _

(He’s always been such a greedy little thing. Always wanting bigger portions of food, wanting more time to ride his bike up and down the streets, wanting to run faster and farther away, wanting more freedom and space and quiet. As he grew up, he learned to tamper his hunger, but now, now he’s a bottomless fucking pit and he doesn’t think he can stop, even if he wanted to.)

It’s intoxicating, all of these new and admittedly scary things inside him. _ Richie _ is intoxicating; he had always been so confident that he knew Richie inside out, that there was nothing about him that he didn’t know. Even after forgetting each other for so long, Eddie had sat in the Jade that night, convinced that he _ knew _Richie Tozier. 

He had been _ wrong_.

He knows that Richie Tozier, the real Richie Tozier, is without a doubt gay. He’s attracted to men and only men. That he always has been, even back when they were kids. 

(“When did you know?” Eddie asks once, late one night in a hotel three blocks down from his office. 

“Twelve,” Richie answers immediately. Before Eddie can say it, Richie answers his next question. “Yeah, I already knew by that summer.” 

Eddie’s overwhelmed. So many things from that summer _ finally _make sense, but he’s also sad, too. “Why didn’t you tell us?” He’s even more sad when Richie just rolls his eyes.

“You forgot where we grew up again, Eds?”

_ You could have told me_, he wants to say. But he doesn’t, because despite Richie not saying anything, Eddie already knows why he couldn’t.)

He knows that despite his size, Richie Tozier likes to be dominated. Richie Tozier likes to have his hair pulled when they’re making out. Richie Tozier likes to be held down when they’re on the couch, grinding against each other. Richie Tozier likes it when Eddie mounts him from behind and rubs against his ass. Richie Tozier likes to be manhandled, be told what to do. Richie Tozier likes to touch, whether it’s holding Eddie by the face when they kiss, or playing with Eddie’s fingers when they’re trying to come down post-orgasm. Richie Tozier is very much what the kids call a _ sub_.

Eddie also finds out what Richie doesn’t like; Richie doesn’t like nipple play, whether it’s fingers or tongue. He says it’s not that it’s bad, it’s just that he doesn’t feel much of anything there. He doesn’t like to wear his glasses when they fool around, says that they just get in the way. He doesn’t like to share a bed overnight; there’s been plenty of times that Eddie’s woken up, only to find Richie on his couch or a hotel chair. There’s always a reason why; he gets too sweaty at night and needs fresh air, he tosses and turns so he doesn’t want to wake Eddie up, he snores like a chainsaw and it would destroy Eddie’s delicate ears. 

Richie calls them reasons, but Eddie knows that they’re actually _ excuses_. He also knows that Richie doesn’t like it when Eddie tries to touch him. He never lets Eddie go down on him, he rarely lets Eddie touch his dick, and when he does, it’s either over his pants or his boxers, it’s never just hand to skin contact. He doesn’t like it when Eddie tries to give him praise; he always rolls his eyes, or wrinkles his nose, or tells Eddie he’s full of shit whenever Eddie tries to give him any semblance of a compliment.

It seems like Richie doesn’t like anything that leads him to being naked, or being seen. He doesn’t know why. But it’s okay, because it’s still the most anyone’s ever given Eddie, so he’ll take it. 

(There’s a part of him that knows he’s lying. It won’t be enough. That’s all he ever does anymore, is lie. Lie to his wife, lie to his best friend, lie to himself. Lie, lie, lie…but then, his mom was a liar, too, and they do say that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

He used to lie to her, too. He had always justified it, always told himself it was a necessary evil. Isn’t that what he’s doing now, to Richie and Myra both? Lying to them both? Maybe that’s just what Kaspbraks do...lie to and hurt the people they love.)

“We need to talk.”

These are the words Eddie has been dreading for months now. He’s been expecting them, of course; he’s not delusional enough to think that he’s going to get away with anything. But knowing they’re coming doesn’t make it any easier to hear. His chest still tightens, his stomach still drops, and he still has to stop himself from visibly shaking.

“We do?”

“Wrap up what you’re doing and meet me in my office in five.”

He had thought that he would hear it from Myra, maybe even Richie. He hadn’t expected it to be his _ boss_.

While he’s relieved that he doesn’t have to have _ the _conversation just yet, he’s still freaked out about whatever it is Jim wants to talk to him about. He’s been working at his firm for ten years now, starting right after he got back from his honeymoon, and he’s never been called into Jim’s office like this before. Not even when he fucked off to Derry on what seemed to be a whim, not even when he had to go before the board in order to get the go ahead to come back to work. For the past ten years, Eddie has been nothing short of a textbook perfect employee.

So he’s not sure what this could be about, and walks into Jim’s office on the verge of a panic attack. It almost turns into a full blown one when he sits down, and Jim says, “We need to talk about all the time you’ve been taking off lately.”

Eddie actually freezes.

He should have known this was coming. He has been taking time off ever since this thing with Richie started, taking three day weekends so he can fly out to Los Angeles on Fridays, taking long lunches so he can meet up with Richie during the day when he’s in New York, even leaving early some nights. He’s been putting in the proper request forms for his weekends, but he may or may not be following the protocol for everything else. He had thought no one would notice; for years, Eddie’s been the star on his team, and he’s still getting all of his work done, so he didn’t think it’d be a big deal.

Apparently it is a big deal.

Finally he finds his voice; it sounds petulant even to his own ears. “I’m sorry, sir, I was under the impression that I’ve been following the handbook in regards to my time off.”

“Yes, that’s not the issue, Eddie. It’s just that you’ve been taking a lot of time off, more than you have in the past five years. And I’ve seen you leave early lately, and you just seem...distracted.”

It takes everything Eddie has not to snort out loud. Yeah, he sure _ is _distracted; having an affair with your childhood best friend while trying to hide it from your wife can be pretty damn distracting. He takes a deep breath before answering Jim. “I’m still meeting all of my deadlines, and I think if you talk to my clients, they are just as pleased with my work as they have been in the past.”

“Hey, hey, nobody is questioning your work, Eddie,” Jim insists. There’s this look on his face, like he’s really thinking before he speaks; it’s setting Eddie’s nerves even more on edge. “No one’s saying anything like that. We’re just concerned, hell, _ I’m _concerned. I called you in because I want to make sure you’re okay.”

Oh. Well, that’s...awkward. Here he’s been gearing up for a fight, when really Jim is just...worried about him? It feels like a trick, a trap of some sort. Why would Jim care about how he’s _ doing _? He’s quiet for a moment, trying to quiet the thoughts in his head, before he replies. “I’m fine,” he says, carefully choosing his words. “I mean, it’s...it’s been an adjustment, I suppose. You know, after my accident…”

“Of course,” Jim says. His voice is soft, friendly, meant to soothe; it’s just making Eddie even more paranoid. “I get that. I mean, I’m not saying that I get it, obviously I don’t really _ know_, I’m not _ you_, but I...you know what I mean.” Eddie doesn’t know what he means, and isn’t sure he wants to. Jim finally just sighs, and looks at him for a moment. “I’m not trying to put you on the spot or anything. Just...if you need to take a personal leave, or anything, we can arrange it. It wouldn’t be a problem.”

“Thank you, sir. But I’m fine.” Jim stares at him, and Eddie feels like his skin is crawling. “I’m sorry if I caused any concern, but I’m fine.”

He walks back to his office, full of embarrassment and shame. He feels like one of those dissection pigs, laying split open on a slab, exposed for everyone to see. His only saving grace is that he’s only got an hour left before he can leave, and Richie’s already in town. His flight got in two hours ago, and he’s waiting in a hotel room for him.

Eddie feels like he’s three seconds away from calling Richie, and telling him that they should get out of New York, get out of Los Angeles, find somewhere else to go, and just escape. It sounds so _ good_; leaving everything behind, leaving their lives behind and making something new. Something where they aren’t Eddie Kaspbrak and Richie Tozier, and can just be Eddie and Richie, without everyone’s eyes on them. He knows it can never happen, but it’s still nice to think about.

But those thoughts are interrupted, and the day goes from bad to worse when his phone rings. It’s Myra. She doesn’t greet him with a hello, doesn’t ask him what he’s doing like she normally does. He picks up the phone, and the first thing she says is, “Daddy’s sick.”

_ Fuck_.

The very first time Myra took Eddie home to meet her parents was the week before Christmas in 2004. It was the first time Myra had brought anyone home in six years, so needless to say, her parents had been very excited to meet him.

Her mother buzzed around him like a bee the entire time, chatting his ear off about any and everything. This was, of course, in between her scolding Myra for everything; reminding her to duck her head during grace, reprimanding her for not offering to refill Eddie’s plate or glass. She embarrassed her daughter when she said, out loud, that Eddie was much more handsome than any of the other guys Myra had brought home, and that she ought to do anything she could to keep him. Myra spent the car ride back to their hotel apologizing, frantically explaining that her mother is actually very nice, really, she just says the wrong thing sometimes. She doesn’t mean to nitpick, honest.

Her father, on the other hand, spent dinner quiet, with his head bowed, shoving forkfuls of sweet potatoes into his mouth. Every time he did try to speak, his wife talked over him, leaning over to straighten his tie or smooth his hair down. He did not attempt to defend his daughter from his wife’s backhanded compliments. He said barely three words to Eddie the entire night. He only looked at Eddie once, and Eddie could see the stress lines all over his face, the weariness in his slack mouth, the defeat in his posture.

Myra had also apologized for him as well, insisting that he was just shy around strangers. Eddie had bitten his tongue and did not tell her the truth, which was that after forty years of marriage, her father was a dead man walking. He had, though, taken her hand and squeezed it, because it had been the first time in their eight month relationship that he understood who Myra _ was_, what she couldn’t say. He had finally felt a kinship with her, felt close to her.

Her parents were her weak spot. For all her flaws, Myra was _ strong_; she was bold and spoke her mind, didn’t sugarcoat her opinions, didn’t let anyone walk all over her. When it came to her parents, though, she was a little girl again, quiet and deferring and eager to please. She still called them Mama and Daddy at thirty-nine years old. She arranged all of their doctor appointments, managed all of their financials, despite them still being in Boston. She bent over backwards to appease them at every turn. He hated it, hated the person she was around them, hated the person she expected him to be around them, but he never brought it up, because when you make a commitment to someone, you don’t hit them below the belt.

So when he gets home from work, and Myra greets him at the door by throwing her arms around him, he returns the gesture. He rubs his hands up and down her shoulder blades as she literally sobs into his shirt. He murmurs, “It’s okay, it’s going to be okay,” when she tells him that the results of her father’s CT scan came in, and they found a tumor on his kidney. He shudders and holds her tighter when she says that it might be cancer.

Both of Eddie’s parents have died from cancer. He doesn’t have to feign empathy for her, because he _ knows _ how she feels to some extent. He _ knows _ that her mind must be racing, like his did when his mom told him her diagnosis. He _ knows _ that it probably feels like a boulder sitting on her chest, just like it did for him when the doctor told him it was terminal. He _ knows _that she’s thinking about a world without her father, and has never been more scared in her life.

Eddie has never been the best husband. That’s never been in question, and he’s been _ especially _terrible recently. But even he’s not so selfish to leave his wife alone tonight, not when she’s still in shock and scared that her father is going to die. He leads her into the living room, sits her down on the couch, and tells her he’ll be right back, he’s going to make her some chamomile tea. 

While he’s in the kitchen, he sends Richie a text, telling him he’s sorry, but he won’t be able to see him tonight. He wonders if he should tell Richie the reason why, but ultimately decides not to. They never talk about Myra, both of them clinging to the idea that if they don’t talk about her, then she doesn’t exist, and they don’t have to worry about it. He’s afraid that if he brings her up now, it’s just going to cause more problems than they all need.

Richie texts back almost immediately, asking if everything’s okay. Right as he’s about to answer, Myra’s tea is ready, and her crying rings in his ears. He slips his phone back in his pocket, and brings his wife her tea. He forgets to answer Richie back, and instead spends the rest of the night trying to be Eddie Kaspbrak, Myra’s husband.

  
  


It’s not that he forgets to text Richie the next two days. With his conversation with Jim still lingering in his head, and trying to support Myra as she talks to her parents about what comes next, he just can’t find the time. 

He’s finally able to sneak off a text in between meetings. He apologizes again for being MIA, that the past couple of days have been crazy stressful. He feels guilty when Richie immediately replies, like he’s been waiting on Eddie all this time. He feels even more guilty when Richie says it’s okay. He’s still in town, Eddie can stop by if he wants to. _ I can help with that stress_, the message says, along with a winking emoji.

_ I can’t. I’m sorry. You can go back home if you want _, he writes back.

It takes almost 45 minutes for Richie’s reply to come through, and all he says is, “_Ok."_

  
  


A couple of days later, Eddie wakes with a jolt when his phone rings at 3 am. He’s disoriented as hell, and scared that the sound is going to wake Myra. They’ve been sleeping in the same room as of late; it seems to be comforting for her to have him there (that, and the temazepam that their doctor prescribed for her). Luckily, she doesn’t stir when Eddie sits up and gets out of bed, and doesn’t move when he steps out of the room and into the hallway. “Hello?”

“Eddie.” Eddie’s pretty sure his heart falls out of his ass at the sound of Richie’s voice. “Eddie,” he repeats again. “Eddie, Eddie, Eddie.”

“What the fuck, Rich, it’s three in the fucking morning,” Eddie hisses. Despite how strong her pills are, he doesn’t want to risk waking Myra. “I have to get up in an hour and a half for work.”

“Eddie,” Richie says again. His voice is low and raspy, almost like he’s been crying. “I forgot, Eddie. I forgot you gotta work. I’m sorry, man. I’m really really sorry.”

“Richie,” Eddie sighs. “Are you okay? You don’t sound okay.”

At that, Richie laughs. It sounds hollow, lifeless, and makes Eddie’s heart clinch in his chest. “I’m sorry, man. I don’t know what I did, I don’t know what I did to make you mad, but I’m really sorry, seriously. Seriously, seriously sorry.”

“What?” Eddie walks into the living room, rubbing his forehead, trying to make himself wake up so he can figure out what the _ hell _is going on. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Last week,” Richie slurs. “I made you mad last week. I’ve been tryin’ and tryin’ and tryin’ to figure out what I did, and I know I did something, but I don’t know what. And I ‘ve been sittin’ here a while, and I was thinkin’, and I know what you’re gonna say, when have you ever sat down and actually _ thought, _Rich... and I thought, hey, I’ll just call and say I’m sorry, that’ll fix it, right? That should fix it.”

For a second, Eddie’s eyes burn, and he wills himself to keep them open, don’t close them, otherwise he might cry. He’s never heard Richie this sad before. “How much have you had to drink, Rich?”

“A lot. It’s been a lot. You know how it goes, Eds, you sit down with a beer, and then bourbon happens, and next thing you know, you’re pretty much floating.” Richie lets out a loud, grating laugh that hurts Eddie’s ears. “Oh shit, I said floating! I didn’t mean like, killer clown floating, just regular floating! You think It’d like bourbon? I wonder what Its drink of choice would be? Can alien demons drink?”

“Jesus Christ, Richie,” Eddie snaps. “I know you’re fucking drunk, but don’t _ say _shit like that. We already have enough nightmare fuel as it is.” Richie gets quiet, so quiet that Eddie starts to think that maybe he fell asleep or something. “Rich, are you there? Rich? What’s wrong?”

Richie sobs. An honest to God sob, and Eddie thinks his heart is going to crack. “Me. _ I’m _what’s wrong. That’s why you didn’t want to see me, right? It’s okay, you can tell me, Eds, you can tell me anything. I’m not mad, I can’t ever be mad at you.”

“Oh God, Rich, _ no_.” Eddie should have known that this would happen. He should have known that Richie would think the worst, think it’s his fault that Eddie couldn’t see him last week or call him or even text him. Of course Richie would think that he did something to make Eddie ignore him like that. “Rich, no, you didn’t...you didn’t do anything wrong, okay? It’s my fault, alright? It’s my fault, you didn’t do _ anything _wrong.”

“Then why’d you ignore me?” Richie asks, his voice small. He’s not sobbing anymore, but Eddie can still hear his soft, little hiccups over the line. “Is it...do you not wanna see me anymore? It’s okay if you don’t, I won’t be mad, I swear, I won’t make it weird or anything, and I won’t tell anyone, I promise-”

“Richie, stop,” Eddie pleads. He swallows the lump forming in his throat. He wants to scream or cry or both, or maybe throw himself down at Richie’s feet and beg for forgiveness. He never meant to make Richie cry, he never meant to hurt him, but he did, that’s what he does, he just hurts the people he cares about the most, why does he have to be so damn _ thoughtless_? “I had a family emergency, alright? Myra...Myra’s dad is sick. It might be cancer. That’s why I couldn’t come, I’ve been with her.”

“Oh.” They’re both quiet for a while. All Eddie can hear is the sound of Richie’s shallow breaths, and his own heart beating erratically. He doesn’t know what to say; he doesn’t know what Richie’s thinking, how he’s feeling, and he’s afraid that if he does say something, he’s going to make it worse. “Oh, oh shit, man, I’m...I’m sorry, I didn’t...I didn’t know.”

“I know. I didn’t...I didn’t know if I should tell you, so I didn’t. So it’s not your fault, okay? It’s mine. I should have told you.”

“No, it’s okay,” Richie insists. “I get why you didn’t, I just...I just get upset, sometimes, you know? Like, I’m not dumb. I know what I’m doing. And I’m fine with it, I am, but then something happens, and instantly it’s like, the end of the fucking world and I do and say dumb shit, and fuck everything up.” He actually laughs then, and it makes Eddie’s blood run cold. “Just ask, like, the dozens of guys I’ve slept with. They’d tell you...oh wait, I forgot, no they wouldn’t.”

Now, Eddie knows that Richie is drunk, and therefore not in full control of himself. He knows that he should just calm Richie down, get him off the phone, and go back to sleep. But he cannot let this last thing go. He’s been dying to know more about Richie’s past, see if any of it can make his current behavior make sense. Maybe explain why he always lets Eddie do whatever he wants, won’t let Eddie touch him, or ask for anything in return. So maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to dig a little deeper, if Richie’s willing to go there. “What do you mean?”

“Oh, I am the _ epitome _ of the phrase, _ Pump and Dump_!” Richie says. There’s an almost gleeful twinge in his voice. It's jarring, like he's jumping back and forth between despair and mania. “In that I’m the one who’s pumped, then dumped. It should be, like, the tagline on my resume, or my Twitter bio or something, cause it’s the story of my fucking _ life_. And every single one of them...and there’s been a _ lot_, trust me... would deny, deny, deny it if they ever took the stand, like, ‘Eww, no, I’d never fuck that ugly fuck. Nope, no way, not even if he was the last guy on earth.” 

For a moment, Eddie feels like he’s been punched in the gut. He can’t believe what Richie’s saying right now; he can’t believe how he’s saying it. Like it’s nothing but a big giant joke, isn’t it just so funny, everyone, laugh at the guy who’s crying even as he tells jokes. That’s all this guy’s life is, a comedy of errors for everyone to point and laugh at, right?

But Eddie’s not laughing. The burning in his eyes intensifies, and he wipes at the tears collecting in the corners. “Rich…”

“No, it’s okay, Eds! Really, I wouldn’t fuck me either. I wouldn’t touch me with a ten foot pole.”

“Is that why you won’t let me touch you?” Eddie finds himself asking, his voice soft. “Cause you think I’m, what, disgusted by you?” Richie’s silence says more than any words could. “You’re _ not _ ugly, Rich. You’re _ not _disgusting. Not like you think.”

“Dude, you don’t have to sugarcoat it, it’s fine-”

“Shut up, Richie! It’s not fucking fine!” There’s a voice in Eddie’s head reminding him to quiet down, he’s going to wake Myra, but it’s the last thing he cares about. Right now all he cares about is making Richie understand that there is absolutely nothing wrong with him. “It’s not fucking fine to say these things about yourself! It’s not fucking fine that...that these guys, whoever they are, just...just shit on you so much that you actually believe them! Because it is not fine, you understand me? And I’m not going to do the same thing to you!”

Richie’s quiet again. Eddie hears him breathing, each one a sharp intake of air, like he’s trying so hard not to cry. Eddie takes the opportunity to continue his tirade. “Apparently you’ve met a lot of shitty people in your life. I’m sorry for that. But there’s nothing wrong with you, Rich. You’re not ugly, you’re not disgusting, and I will tell you every fucking day if I have to. You understand me?” When Richie doesn’t say anything, Eddie finds himself pleading, “I know you’re drunk right now. But tell me you’re listening to me. Tell me you understand. Please, baby, tell me you _understand_.”

He freezes. He hadn’t meant to say that. The baby endearment just slipped out, without him even knowing it. He’s never called anyone baby before. Not even Myra; sweetheart is reserved for her, because while it’s an endearment, there’s almost an innocence to it. Baby is more personal. Baby is something you say to someone you...someone you really…

He’s pulled from his thoughts by the sound of Richie’s voice. “I understand,” he says, soft and almost meek. “I’m sorry, Eds. I didn’t...I didn’t mean to upset you, I swear.”

“You didn’t upset me, I just...don’t want you to think that way. Cause you’re like, the best fucking thing I’ve got going right now, man. You know that, right?”

“I am?”

“Yes, you fucking jerk. Even when you call me drunk at three in the fucking morning.” He hears Richie laugh, and some of the weight that he’s been sitting on his chest for the past twenty minutes lifts. “Are you good?”

“Yeah...yeah, I’m good,” Richie says. His slurring is getting worse; Eddie suspects he’s crashing after exerting that much emotional energy. He can’t imagine how dehydrated he must be after all the crying he’s done tonight. Maybe Eddie can get him to go to bed and try to sleep this off. Hopefully the hangover won’t be too bad tomorrow. Hopefully this has been reassuring, and Richie will feel even just a little bit better. God, Eddie hopes so.

“Good. Now go to fucking bed, please. I’ll text you in the morning and remind you to take some fucking aspirin for the headache I _ know _you’re going to have tomorrow.”

“Yeah, I know.” Richie’s so quiet that Eddie thinks he’s fallen asleep. But then he says, in the softest, sweetest voice, “You know, you’re the best thing in my life, too. Always have been, Eds.”

Eddie tries not to cry at that. He’s able to hold it off until they’ve said goodnight, and Eddie hangs up the phone. The tears definitely come, albeit slowly, quietly. He doesn’t remember the last time he cried. 

He doesn’t go back into his and Myra’s bedroom. He doesn’t even go into the guest bedroom. He sits on the couch, staring into the fireplace waiting for six am to come so he can start getting ready for work, and tries to drown out the sound of Richie crying that’s lingering in his head. 

(There’s always been a litany of voices in his head. His mom’s, the clown’s, Myra’s, his own. Now Richie’s has joined the chorus. 

It’s going to play on a loop for the rest of his life.)


	6. VI. I'm gonna run to you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hi y'all! We're in weird fucking times, aren't we? Don't worry, cause I just got sent into quarantine and I'm here for your monthly dose of pain and angst!!!!! Okay, it's not JUST pain and angst, there's also introspection? A little growth on Eddie's part? He's finally getting a damn clue here. Could we possibly be getting to the point where they may be...gasp...happy?!?!!?!?!?! WHO KNOWS!!!!!
> 
> So thank you again to everyone who's read this, left kudos, comments, all of it. I love and appreciate any kind of acknowledgment! If you want to just say, "Hey, this is good, I dug it" I'm good with that too! And if you want to come scream at me about Reddie or Bill Hader or the state of the world, DO IT!!!!!! I'm at red-sky.tumblr.com, you can talk to me about whatever, whenever!!!!!

Things do not get easier. Richie doesn’t acknowledge their drunken conversation; when Eddie asks him how he’s feeling the next morning, all he says is fine, and immediately changes the subject. But Eddie knows he’s lying, and it just gets worse in the weeks that follow. He starts calling just a little bit less. He takes a little bit longer to answer Eddie’s texts. When they do talk, their conversations are just a little bit shorter, and Richie always seems distracted. This is how it starts, anyway. Within a month, it’s at the point where they barely talk at all.

In theory, this should be a good thing. Eddie should feel relieved that the affair seems to be dying out, but it’s not just the affair that’s dying. He knows he’s being dramatic, but it almost feels like their friendship is dying, too. It’s the worst thing he’s ever felt in his life.

Which is saying a _ lot_, coming from a man who almost died at the hands of an evil space clown.

But it’s true. Richie is slipping away from him. It hurts, more than Eddie can possibly articulate. But he can’t blame Richie for it. He knows Richie’s embarrassed, and pointing it out isn’t going to help anything. He’ll just retreat even more, because that’s what he’s always done, ever since they were kids. If you just let it go and pretend nothing ever happened, he’ll eventually come back around. 

So Eddie doesn’t bring it up. He doesn’t ask Richie what’s wrong, or accuse him of being cold, or demand that he stop acting like this. He figures that eventually, things will go back to normal. Now what normal that is, he’s not sure, but it’ll be some kind of normal, whether it’s their old one or their new one.

It goes on like this for weeks. It’s not until he gets a phone call from Beverly that he really starts to understand that there is something terribly, terribly _ wrong_.

Now, Bev calling is not necessarily a bad thing. It’s not even out of the ordinary; they all try to talk whenever they can, whether it be in a group call or an individual one. He’s talked to Bev several times, just the two of them, and he’s always enjoyed his talks with her just a little more than his talks with the others, minus Richie. It’s just that...well, sometimes it’s just easier to talk to women about the deep, sometimes ugly shit. Not to mention that they have a lot in common, way more than they ever realized as kids, and it’s just nice sometimes, to talk to someone who gets it. 

However, this phone call in particular is not one of their usual ones, where they catch each other up on what’s going on in their lives, like divorce proceedings or physical therapy or their crazy parents. After pleasantries are exchanged, and they’ve bullshitted around for a few minutes, Bev clears her throat, and says, “Hey, I was just wondering...have you talked to Richie lately?”

If it is humanly possible for blood to freeze in the vein, that’s what Eddie’s blood would be doing right now. A refrain runs through his head, _ shit, shit, she knows, she knows _ . He has no idea how she _ could _know; there had been an understanding between him and Richie that they would not tell the rest of their friends about what was going on. He can’t imagine Richie telling anyone, not even Bev. So how the fuck does she know?

“Uh...not lately,” he finds himself stammering. Because stammering and stuttering isn’t a sign that something’s going on, nope, not at all. “Why, have you talked to him?”

Bev lets out a sigh that makes all the hair on Eddie’s arms stand up. “Just briefly. That’s the problem. We’d talk all the time, but for the past few weeks he’s been...distracted or something.”

Eddie had thought it was him, that Richie was just pulling away from him. Apparently that’s not the case. “Really? Has he said anything about...like...a new project or anything?”

“No,” Bev answers. He hears the flick of a lighter, and he can see standing out on her balcony, furiously chain smoking. “He didn’t say anything about a new project. It’s just weird, Eds, normally he answers me almost immediately, now it’s days before he sends back one word texts. I’m worried about him.”

“I’m sure he’s fine.” Eddie knows that she can hear the crack in his voice. But he can’t help it, his thoughts are racing a million miles an hour, trying not to freak out because it’s one thing for Richie to ignore him (he knows he deserves it), but ignoring Bev? That’s a big fucking red flag. “He’s probably just busy, and means to call back and just forgets. You know what his attention span’s like.”

“I don’t know. I just...I’m worried. He’s been dealing with so much, you know? I know the dreams have really been fucking with him-”

Eddie’s stomach flips. His chest tightens. He desperately wants an inhaler, and has to remind himself that this isn’t an asthma attack, this is anxiety. “What? What do you mean, dreams? What kind of dreams?”

The way Bev pauses, the tone of her voice, makes Eddie think his chest is going to collapse any second. Any second now, and his chest is going to collapse and no one will be able to fix it this time. “He...he’s been having dreams since we left Derry,” she says, clearly choosing her words carefully. “Well, not dreams, more like nightmares. He hasn’t told me all of it, but we think it’s from...from the Deadlights, you know?”

He had thought it couldn’t get worse. He had really, really thought it couldn’t get worse. But it was. It was so much worse than he had known, and now all Eddie can think about is all the times he’s found Richie sleeping on his couch in the morning, or a chair in their hotel room, all of his excuses for why he wouldn’t sleep in bed with him...he had been having nightmares. He’s been having nightmares all this time, and Eddie never knew, never even _ suspected_.

“I didn’t know,” he finds himself murmuring. “I didn’t know, he didn’t...he didn’t tell me, Bev, why didn’t he _tell _me?”

“Oh _ Eds_, honey, he didn’t even want to tell me.” If Eddie didn’t love Bev so much, he’d almost hate the concern in her voice. “I had to literally drag it out of him. You know how he gets, he’s always worrying about everyone else.”

“Oh, I know.” Eddie does know this, very, very intimately. Even before they were sleeping together, Rich was always checking on him. In the hospital, when he went back home, when he started physical therapy, Richie was always reaching out to see how he was doing. “He just...doesn’t think anyone would give a shit, which is just dumb, it’s so fucking dumb, Bev. Of course we give a shit.”

“It’s not dumb to him,” Bev says softly, and it almost feels like a reprimand, despite her gentle tone. “I don’t know, Eds. I’m just so worried about him. And I thought, if anyone might know what’s going on, it’d be you. You guys have always been so close.”

There’s so much Eddie wants to say right now. He wants to throw himself on the altar of truth and tell Bev everything; that he and Richie are having an affair, he’s been cheating on his wife and jerking Richie around for months now. He wants to tell Bev how confused he is, how scared he is. How he sometimes dreams about building an honest to God _ life _ with Richie, but remembers that _ Myra _ already loves him so much, how could he _ possibly _ want more. He wants to ask Bev what he should do. He needs someone to tell him what to do, because _ clearly _he can’t be trusted to figure it out himself.

But he can’t. Not only would it be betraying Richie, but he can’t stand the thought of Bev thinking so ill of him. And she would, there’s no doubt in his mind that if she knew everything Eddie’s done, she would be disappointed in him. He can’t bear that. He’s never been able to bear the disappointment of the people he loves.

So he swallows the shame in his throat, and buries it down deep, like he always does. “I don’t know, Bev. I really don’t know.”

Now his web of lies is ensnaring the rest of his friends. He’s never hated himself more.

  
  


Mike is the next one who calls.

Eddie’s not surprised that it’s Mike. If he would have put his money on anyone, it would have been Mike. Bill is super busy right now, with his new movie coming out and the publicity tours. If Eddie remembers right, Bill is in Japan right now with Audra and the rest of the cast. And Ben, well, Eddie’s sure that Ben already knows what’s going on, thanks to Bev, and is just waiting for the right time to bring up his own concerns. And ever since they left Derry, Mike calls all of them every single day, keeping himself tuned in to them, as if he’s trying to remind himself every day that he is not alone. 

He’s been traveling west for a few weeks now, sleeping in tents in Wyoming, attempting to learn to ski in Colorado. He calls Eddie when he stops for the night at a hotel in New Mexico, and they shoot the shit for a while, talking about Mike’s travels, where he’s going next. Just like with Bev, it takes a few minutes for the conversation to turn to Richie. “Hey, man, you talked to Richie recently?”

Eddie sighs and rubs his forehead. That sick feeling he felt a week ago when he and Bev talked returns. “Not recently,” he says. “Why, have you?”

“A few times,” Mike answers. Eddie feels relieved for about five seconds, and then Mike continues. “I was just wondering, do you know if everything’s okay with him?”

No. Everything is _ not _okay with Richie. But just like with Bev, Eddie doesn’t know what he can and can’t say. “Bev told me the other day she’s been worried about him,” he says. “Apparently he’s not answering her texts and calls as often. Like he’s busy or something.”

“Well, he’s been calling me,” Mike says. Eddie’s surprised. “He’s been calling me a lot lately, late at night. He’s...well. He’s always drunk.”

_ Fuck_. Eddie wishes this was a surprise, but it’s not. He forces himself to take a deep breath. He cannot have a panic attack right now. “How drunk?”

“Smashed, man. I’m talking, like, slurring his words, not making any sense,” Mike answers. “He keeps asking me questions about...about what it was like, you know. During the 27 years you guys were gone and I was in Derry. How did I deal with it, how could I stand being alone for so long. Things like that. The other night, he asked me if I ever thought I was going to die like that. Alone.”

It takes everything Eddie has not to sob out loud. He even brings his fist to his mouth and bites down so he won’t completely lose his shit. He can’t even fathom what Mike’s telling him, what it means. He doesn’t understand how it’s come to this, this point where Richie is so, so far away, seemingly lost in this vicious, ugly spiral. He doesn’t understand how he didn’t see it coming. He doesn’t understand how he could have let this happen.

The silence between him and Mike is tense. He wonders if Mike can feel his turmoil over the phone. Mike’s always had a sixth sense for things like pain and grief, having experienced it at such a young age. He’s so smart, in ways Eddie was never allowed to be. Eddie envies him for it. He finally speaks, slowly, almost carefully. “I don’t...I don’t think it’s just drunken rambling, Eddie. I think there’s something very, very wrong. I just, I just don’t know what it is.”

Eddie knows. He’s been thinking about this for a long time now, and he knows what’s wrong. He’s known Richie his entire life, Richie’s his best friend, he _ knows _him. The past few months are finally getting to him, and he’s cracking. The secrecy, the lies, the guilt, it’s reached a boiling point, and he can’t handle it anymore. It’s too much for him, so he’s drinking to push it down. He’s drinking to numb himself, so he doesn’t feel any of it anymore.

But the thing is, Eddie suspects that even if they weren’t doing this, Richie would still be unhappy. He would still be embarrassed and ashamed and scared. He’d still be hiding in the closet. He’d still be pulling away from the people who love him and drinking himself into stupors every night. He’d still hate himself more than anyone else ever could.

But why? That’s what Eddie doesn’t understand. He doesn’t understand why Richie _ hates _himself so much.

It’d be easy to blame the clown for it. He wants to, he wants to blame _ all _of their fucked up shit on the clown. But Eddie’s older now, and he can look back on everything now and see that it started earlier than the clown. It started so, so much earlier than the fucking clown.

It suddenly dawns on Eddie, where it started. Like with most people, it started with his parents.

Now, in terms of parents in Derry, the Toziers had been pretty decent. They weren’t oppressive like Eddie’s mother had been, or abusive like Bev’s father had been. They did care for Richie, in that he never went without the material things. He always had clean clothes, good food, a roof over his head, an appropriate amount of toys. They never hit him, not once. They would just let Richie do whatever he wanted as long as it wasn’t illegal. They gave him so much freedom, to go wherever he wanted, wear whatever he wanted, do whatever he wanted. And Eddie had been so jealous of it, thinking that the Toziers were just so cool, wishing that his mom had been more like the Toziers instead.

But Eddie also remembers having dinner with them, and Richie would just talk, talk all of their ears off. Going on about what they did at school, who brought the class cupcakes for their birthday, who farted on the school bus. And he remembers how many times Maggie or Wentworth would respond back with, _ sit up straight, elbows off the table, chew with your mouth closed, Richard, lower your voice, Richard._

He remembers all the times they would come back to Richie’s house after hours of running around on their bikes, and he’d try out a new Voice for his parents, and how they both would just nod, sometimes give him a brief smile, and go back to what they were doing. He remembers every end of the school year party, and Wentworth being too busy at work to come watch Richie receive his awards for honor roll. He remembers never seeing any of those awards hanging up in the house, either.

He looks back now, and he remembers the way Richie would reach out to one of them sometimes. In small, simple ways, like sitting down at his mom’s feet while she watched TV or leaning over his dad while he was reading the newspaper in his chair. He remembers the way Richie would look at them, adoringly, silently pleading for them to _ look _at him. He remembers the way Richie would bite his lip when they wouldn’t. He remembers the way Richie would sometimes fold in on himself when they told him they were busy, take Eddie upstairs and play.

He remembers Richie telling him that he could count on one hand the number of times his mother or father said they loved him. He remembers Richie telling him it was easy for him to sneak out at night and come to Eddie’s house because his parents never checked on him. _ As soon as my door closes, I no longer exist to them_, he had said.

And he remembers how scared Richie had been in Neibolt, looking at that missing poster of himself. It wasn’t a secret that Richie didn’t like to be alone, but it’s not until recently that Eddie understood the reason (one of them, anyway) why it had scared him so much. He hadn’t just been looking at his own worst fear; he had been looking at the reality he already lived in.

Eddie also knows that it hasn’t gotten better as Richie has gotten older. Richie has told him the story of how pissed they had been when he dropped out of college, and didn’t talk to him for months. It wasn’t even about the money, since he had gotten several scholarships to pay for school. They were just pissed because, in Richie’s words, what were they supposed to tell their extended family when they asked what he was up to.

He’s also told Eddie about how he tried to get them to come to California when they retired a few years ago, even offering to _ buy _ them a nice, little condo. He wanted them closer, cause they were getting older and he thought it would just make things easier for everyone. They moved to Florida instead, claiming they wanted to be close to the beach. Like Richie didn’t live in California, and didn’t live a few miles away from _ several _beaches.

They definitely don’t know about Richie being gay, and Eddie doubts they ever will. He wonders what Richie fears more, if he were to tell them; their scorn, or their indifference.

So just as Eddie learned his first lessons on love from his mother, Richie learned _ his _ first from his parents, too. _ Not even your parents want you. No one will _ ** _ever _ ** _ want you, and it is _ ** _ your fault._**

It would explain so much. It would explain why he’s never come out, why he can’t even say the _ word _ gay out loud. It would explain why he apparently sleeps with men who won’t give him anything, or even _ acknowledge _ him, not even in private. It would explain why he never asked Eddie for anything, and why he’s pulled away after daring to show his emotions for once. It would explain why he’s ignoring Bev, calling Mike late at night and asking morose questions about being alone, drinking more and more to numb himself, so he can do the only thing he thinks he’s good for... _ pretending_.

It’s not that Richie doesn’t want intimacy. Eddie has a lifetime of memories that says otherwise. He _ wants _ it. He _ wants _ to be seen and known. He _ wants _ to be acknowledged and praised. He _ wants _ to be loved. But he’s scared of it, because the lesson he’s taken from every single relationship he’s ever had, platonic or not, is that he doesn’t deserve it. And if he asks for it, then someone will _ realize _ that oh shit, he _ doesn’t _deserve it, and run away from him.

So he creates and clings to boundaries. He’s been doing it the entire time they’ve been sleeping together. He’s created physical and mental boundaries both, using things like time zone differences and his career and booze to strengthen them. Hell, he’s been doing it since they were kids, using jokes and voices and crude gestures as shields.

He thinks he’s doing it for everyone else. He thinks he’s saving everyone from himself, but what he doesn’t know is that he’s doing the exact opposite. He’s only protecting himself, keeping himself safe. Because you can’t get hurt if you don’t let anyone in. You can’t get hurt if you don’t let anyone see you. If you push them away first, they can’t leave you.

And if you end up killing yourself, either literally or metaphorically, so what? That’s even better. Better to die a painful death than live a painful life.

This is bad. This is so, so fucking bad.

“Eddie?” he hears Mike call out to him. “You still there?”

“Yeah,” he whispers. “I’m still here. I think...no, I know there’s something wrong. He’s not okay. I’ll...I’ll talk to him. I’ll figure out what’s going on.”

“I mean, I can talk to him, too,” Mike offers.

“No,” Eddie shakes his head. “No. It has to be me. He’s only going to talk to me, we all know that.”

Eddie hears Mike sigh over the line. “We know. When it comes to Rich, it’s always been you.”

_ You don’t even know _ , Eddie thinks to himself. _ You don’t even know the half of it, Mikey. _

  
  


Eddie finds and books the first non stop flight he can find. It’s not as early as he’d like, it’ll put him in Los Angeles tomorrow after nine pm, but it’ll do. It’s expensive as hell, despite it being a Wednesday, but oh well. He drafts a quick email to Jim, telling him he’ll be gone the rest of the week. He does not go into details. He’s definitely going to get written up for this, maybe even fired. He doesn’t care. He can always find another job somewhere else, maybe at a firm with a west coast branch.

He plans to use his usual excuse with Myra, meeting up with those west coast clients he’s been working with for months. She’s been so preoccupied lately, with everything going on with her father, that Eddie doesn’t think she’ll protest much. 

He is wrong. She comes upstairs to find him packing, and she loses her _ shit_.

“This is ridiculous!” She keeps screaming. She’s pacing in front of the bed, swinging her arms around wildly, face beet red. Her voice gets higher and higher as she keeps screaming. “You’ve been _ gallivanting _ around the country for _ months _ , and now they want to send you on _ another _ trip? Did you even _ tell _them that Daddy’s sick?”

Myra’s father is scheduled for surgery in two weeks to remove the tumor on his kidney. She’s talked about driving out to Boston and staying for a week with her parents to help with his recovery; she’s mentioned a couple of times that she would like Eddie to come with her. He’s been blowing her off. He also did not tell Jim that his father-in-law was ill. 

Instead of answering Myra’s question, Eddie keeps his attention on the task at hand, which is packing. He goes through the top drawer of their dresser and starts pulling out a couple of pairs of boxers, a couple of pairs of socks. He’s not sure how long he’s going to be gone for.

His silence only enrages Myra more. “Oh, of _ course_! Of _ course _you haven’t told them! It interferes with you being their little errand boy!” The way she laughs is familiar, grating. “They say jump, and you ask how high! If they told you to jump off a cliff, you would!”

It takes everything he has not to scream, and he’s impressed with how controlled his voice sounds when he replies. “I’m sorry, but this is important, Myra. I don’t have a choice, I have to go.”

“But what about _ me_?” she cries. This part is also familiar, the part where her anger turns into guilt tripping. “I never see you anymore, Eddie! You’re always at work or you’re talking to your new friends, and you never talk to me! We never _ talk_!”

“Okay, first of all…” Before he can even stop himself, he turns away from the dresser and faces her, unaware of the way his eyes are practically burning holes into her forehead. “They are not my _ new _ friends. I’ve known them since I was a kid. I haven’t seen them in 27 years, and you’re bringing them up _ now _ ?” he snaps. “How would you like it if you hadn’t seen Stephanie, or Lisa, or Sherry for that long and _ I _ got mad at _ you _ cause you wanted to see them? Would you like that, Myra? Would _ you _ like me bringing up your friends when _ I’m _ mad at _ you _for something completely different?”

Now, if he wasn’t so wound up, Eddie would find the look on Myra’s face right now absolutely comical. Her eyes are so wide they’re about to crack her skull, her eyebrows are so raised they’re almost in her hairline, and she keeps opening and closing her mouth. Clearly she wasn’t expecting him to argue back; she looks like her head is about to explode. Eddie also thinks she looks like a fish. “_ What _ ...in God’s name...has gotten _ into _ you?” she sputters. “I’m just trying to tell you that I miss you, and you...you _ attack _me like this?”

“I’m not _ attacking _you-”

“Yes you are!” The tears have started like clockwork. Myra really isn’t a pretty cryer; the tears cling to her eyelashes, and make them look like spider legs. But what she says next, he’s not expecting. “You haven’t been the same since you came back from that trip, Eddie. Something’s going on, I know it. Just tell me.”

He stops moving and just looks at her for a moment, and he thinks about it, about actually telling her the truth. The problem is, he’s not exactly sure what the truth is anymore. 

“I can’t do this right now, Myra,” is what he finally says. “We’ll talk when I get back.” Maybe he means it. Maybe he doesn’t. He has no idea at the moment.

She stomps out of their bedroom and doesn’t speak to him for the rest of the night. She’s already gone to work when he wakes up the next morning. That’s okay. Myra might miss him, but Richie _ needs _him. Eddie knows where he’s got to be right now.

  
  


His flight is about six hours, give or take, with no layover, so this gives him a lot of time to think. He’s realized that he’s reached the point of no return; he has to make a decision. Richie or Myra. Myra or Richie.

He starts with establishing the facts; this is how any self-respecting risk analyst would begin to problem solve.

1\. He is having an affair with another man.

2\. It is not just a sexual affair, either; this is not just some random guy he met off the street and is getting his rocks off with.

3.It’s his best friend, whom he’s known his entire life. Whom he almost died for.

These are the true, undeniable objective facts. But other than that, everything else about the situation feels...subjective, to say the least.

Probably the first subjective factor is Eddie’s sexuality. It may seem dumb; he’s sleeping with a man, duh, he must be gay. But is he _ really_? Sure, he likes having sex with Richie, but is it that he likes having sex with men in general? That...that he’s not so sure about. Maybe it’s that he likes having sex with _ Richie_. Maybe it’s only _ Richie _that he’s attracted to.

This makes sense to Eddie. Because yes, there have been times in the past where he has looked at another man and thought they were attractive, but he’s also done the same with women. He’s always been able to look at someone and think, yes, objectively, this person is good-looking. But that doesn’t mean he wanted to _ sleep _ with them. It’s almost like going to a museum, and admiring the beautiful art there; it doesn’t mean you want to _ fuck _it.

But he definitely looks at Richie, and wants to fuck him. That sounds so crass, but whatever. It’s true.

Okay, so maybe he’s only attracted to Richie, which makes sense because he’s known Richie his entire life. Maybe instead of just throwing a blanket label of gay on himself maybe it’s more complex than that. Can it _ be _more complex than that? It has to be, right? Maybe gender doesn’t really matter, as long as there’s a connection of some sort. There’s a word for that, right? There’s words for every aspect of sexuality nowadays. Maybe that’s what he is.

Alright. That feels more comfortable. Less...restrictive, more authentic.

Another fact; he does not feel the same kind of attraction towards Myra. He has never looked at her and wanted to sleep with her. He doesn’t think he ever will, and it’s not her fault. It’s just never been there, and he just ignored it.

But there is something between them. There is a connection, a kinship, an emotional relationship that they’ve spent the last twelve years building with each other. They’ve grown up together in a way, too; they’ve been together through career changes, job losses, deaths in the family. They’ve bought a house together, they’ve created a social circle of friends together. They’ve built an entire _ life _together. That has to account for something, right? There has to be something there for them to be able to do that, right?

And objectively, it’s not a bad life. They have a beautiful home. They are financially stable and can do pretty much whatever they please, within reason. They have someone to come home to. Is that something he wants to destroy? Does he really want to destroy something he’s spent the last twelve years building?

But then there’s a voice in his head, whispering burn it, burn it down. He can build a new life. He can build a new one with Richie.

He thinks about that. About what it would be like to be with Richie every single day, wake up with him, go to bed with him, eat breakfast and lunch and dinner with him. He thinks about the two of them buying a house together, and the constant laughter and bickering that would fill it. He thinks about hearing Richie’s monologues before everyone else does, and Richie’s hands on his shoulders as he brings him down from a panic attack brought on by work. He thinks he could be happy with that. It could be a good life; it could be a great life.

But it could also go wrong. Say he does decide to leave Myra and be with Richie; are they going to announce it to the world? Coming out will not be easy; hell, Eddie doesn’t know if coming out would even be an option. Sure, they could tell their friends, but what about everyone else? Eddie works in a field that skewers conservative; would coming out have a negative impact on his career? Would he be passed over for promotions for one reason or another? Will he lose the respect of his co-workers? Would he be harassed into quitting, and be blackballed in the industry?

And what about _ Richie’s _ career? He wouldn’t be coming out to just the people in his life, he’d be coming out to the _ entire _world. Eddie knows Richie isn’t ready for that; he doesn’t know if Richie will ever be ready for that. And even if he is ready for that, it would without a doubt affect his career. He’d lose the majority of his fanbase and have to start all over again. He’d be typecasted into certain roles because people still think that gay people can’t play straight. He’d forever be known as the Gay Comedian and be held to expectations he can’t possibly meet. He’d be subject to so much abuse, so much homophobia. He wouldn’t be able to handle that. 

So that would mean they would still have to hide. They’d still have to keep each other a secret, and that can kill relationships. They’re both already crumbling under the strain now, remaining a secret for the rest of their lives would destroy them.

So what is he supposed to do? Does he just...upend Myra’s entire life, force her to start all over for what could be a fantasy? Does he just break Richie’s heart, give him even more reason to hate himself? 

What is he supposed to do?

  
  


By the time he lands, Eddie still hasn’t decided. He tries to put the thought out of his mind and focus on what he came here to do.

He did not tell Richie that he was coming. He didn’t want to give Richie time to construct a false narrative of lies and smiles to placate him. He doesn’t reach out to Richie until he’s waiting for his bag in baggage claim, and sends him a text. _ I’m in town. I’m getting an Uber, make sure you’re home in 45 minutes._

Richie responds back immediately. _ What?????_

_ I’m in LA. I’ll be at your house in 45 minutes._

Richie doesn’t respond back. Eddie didn’t expect him to. 

  
  


By the time the Uber drops him off, Eddie is practically vibrating. Nerves, anxiety, fear, it’s all inside him, tumbling around in his chest and his stomach. He doesn’t know what he’s walking into; he doesn’t know if Richie’s going to be mad at him or upset with him. He doesn’t know if Richie’s going to scream at him or start crying. He’ll probably be drunk, either way.

When Richie answers the door, though, everything in the past 24 hours fades away. All of the questions Eddie’s been asking himself, all the scenarios he’s run through, none of it matters. Richie is standing there, barefoot and his eyebrows furrowed in confusion. It’s like Eddie’s entire being just relaxes and whispers, _ ah, there he is_.

“Eds?” Richie asks. 

Eddie answers him by stepping up to him, grabbing him by the face, and pulling him down for a kiss. Richie freezes, and Eddie can feel confusion and uncertainty and the ever present restraint radiating from him. 

But Eddie doesn’t pull away. He keeps kissing Richie. And eventually, he feels the tension fade from Richie’s body, and Richie _ melts _against him. He wraps his arms around Eddie’s waist, tilts his head into the kiss, and it feels just like their first kiss.

They finally have to pull away to breathe. They stare at each other for a moment, Eddie breathily heavily, Richie licking his lips like he’s savoring Eddie’s taste. “We gotta talk,” Eddie says.

Richie nods. “I know,” he replies. “Later, though. We’ll talk later.” He pulls Eddie inside by the collar of his jacket, and Eddie kicks the door shut behind him. They stumble back, and Eddie pushes Rich up against the wall. Their lips immediately meet, and it’s even _ better _than that first kiss. 

_ There he is_, that voice whispers again in Eddie’s head. _ Home. Home, home, home. _


End file.
